MEMOIR 



MISS MARGARET MERCER, 



BY 



CASPAR MORRIS, M. D. 



Nihil human i a me alienum puto." 



SECOND EDITION, WITH ADDITIONS. 



PHILADELPHIA: 

LINDSAY & BLAKISTON. 
1848. 






Entered, according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1847, 

By Lindsay & Blakiston, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Eastern District 

of Eennsylvania. 



Wm. S.Young, Primer, 









PREFACE 



THE SECOND EDITION. 



The rapid sale of the first edition of this little 
work exhausting it within a few weeks, and the de- 
mand for the second, has afforded the most gratify- 
ing evidence to the editor, that he did not over es- 
timate the worth of Miss Mercer, nor place an un- 
due value upon the amount of good influence he 
hoped would result from the dissemination of the 
knowledge of the traits of sanctified character dis- 
played in her letters, and the few incidents it was 
in his power to collect. As the contemplation of 
things beautiful and pure, not only enkindles in 
every bosom the wish to attain to beauty and purity, 
but produces the actual accomplishment of the desire 
it excites, it is important to present constantly to the 
minds of the young especially, such subjects as shall 
draw out aspirations after that "holiness, without 



IV PREFACE TO THE 

which no man shall see the Lord/' — Piety could not 
be presented with a more attractive aspect, than that 
it wore in the character of Miss Mercer. 

When the author first undertook the grateful task 
he has now accomplished, it was with the almost cer- 
tain expectation, that abundant material would be fur- 
nished from the correspondence she was known to 
have maintained, with friends of congenial spirit, and 
pupils to whom she was attached with the warmest af- 
fection. In this he has been disappointed. Numerous 
letters he found had been destroyed at her own re- 
quest. In other cases the persons to whom they were 
addressed, felt themselves restrained from furnish- 
ing them for publication by her known reluctance to 
subject her letters to the eyes of others, than those 
to whom they had been addressed. Some indeed 
that would have been especially interesting were 
destroyed by her own hand. Many still in existence 
are scattered in remote positions, inaccessible to the 
editor. The purity of her thought, the graceful ease, 
yet dignity of her style, render her letters even 
upon common subjects, interesting. But when she 
touches the keys which cause the deeper cords of 
the soul to vibrate, she brings forth such harmony 
as fills the heart with sensations kindred at least to 



SECOND EDITION. V 

those we shall know in that higher state of existence 
to which she was ever tending with a steady flight. 
The following letter, taken from a packet received 
after the last sheet had gone to press, contains so 
much of the pure gold of consolation for the be- 
reaved believer, wrought with a skill so exquisite, 
that the temptation to present it even here is irre- 
sistible. It was written while she was at Mrs. Gar- 
nett's school, at a time when the waves of affliction 
had passed heavily over her own soul, and was ad- 
dressed to a relative suffering under a severe be- 
reavement. 

"How much, my precious cousin, have I wished, 
in your present affliction, that I could make it con- 
sistent with my engagements to be with you. How 
truly have I been with you in spirit! for I know 
that trusting perfectly, as you do, in the wisdom and 
goodness of our Father, yet, for the time, this ex- 
pression of His will must be a grievous trial. I am 
consoled for your sufferings by the reflection that 
such events (in those who have true faith) always 
lead to a closer walk with God ; and that you, whose 
thoughts have so long been employed in realizing 
the nature of our future Canaan and its dear delights 
will look upon your sainted Juliet as merely travel- 

1* 



VI PREFACE TO THE 

ling a stage before you, and being already watching 
anxiously for your arrival. Blessed land of promise! 
how joyful should be our pilgrimage here, after we 
have come within view of the shrine, and see the 
beloved spirits which are worshipping around it! 
Even now I behold a circle of my dearest earthly 
treasures, my best beloved friends, seated, like 
Mary, at the feet of Jesus — receiving the full tide 
of infinite and eternal wisdom from his lips. 

But not like poor Mary's are the spiritual minds 
to which the blessed things of that third heaven are 
addressed. No veil' of flesh clouds the perceptions 
of truth: and your dear Juliet, doubtless, looks back 
with unalloyed gratitude, to see that even the tears 
which now dim your eyes, — the pangs which now 
shake your feeble frame, are all means of purifica- 
tion, and are all completing the glorious work of 
sanctification which must be wrought in the chil- 
dren of the resurrection before they go hence. 

Rejoice in suffering — how foolish, how enthusias- 
tic to the worldling is this idea — and yet how clearly 
defined, how well founded, how rational,how honour- 
able to God and consistent with long experience, is 
the Christian's profession of rejoicing in suffering, 
— seeing that the • Captain of our salvation was per- 



SECOND EDITION. Vll 

fected through suffering/ My beloved cousin, I re- 
joice with you in your sufferings. I thank my 
heavenly Father that neither you nor I have been 
left without chastening. Even now, in the third 
watch of the night, a little before that hour when 
the mourners went to be comforted at the tomb, — 
paying their last duties to the beloved dead, and 
receiving the glorious evidence of life and immor- 
tality in another state — now, when the whole earth, 
except the sick and sorrowing are buried in sleep — 
I have raised myself on my bed, to express to you, 
my dearly beloved friend, the sincere delight with 
which I reflect, that though Satan may bind you in 
the cords of human infirmity lo these many years, — 
yet Christ has wrought the miracle which is to 
make you straight." .... Sentiments more pure, 
language more appropriate, feelings more sublime, 
it were vain to seek. May they find their way to 
many a broken-hearted, bereft mother, and fill her 
with ' peace and joy in believing/ 

Many incidents illustrative of her active benevo- 
lence have been narrated to the editor, but so in- 
volved with the feelings of living friends as to ren- 
der it improper to detail them in print. Here they 
would add lustre to her crown of human praise. 



Vlll PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 

Hereafter they will prove the truth of the declara- 
tion of Jesus himself, "They that turn many to 
righteousness shall shine as the sun in the kingdom 
of my Father." 



Clinton Square, 
February 16th, 1848. 



PKEFACE TO FIRST EDITION. 



It has not been with the design of magnifying 
the reputation of Miss Mercer, or heaping adulation 
on her memory for the gratification of surviving 
friends, that this memoir of her character has been 
prepared for the public. u By the grace of God " 
she was what she is here exhibited, whether we have 
regard to her natural endowment or subsequent spi- 
ritual attainment. As respects herself, her record 
is on high, and human praise or censure is of no 
account; and of her friends, but a few rapidly pass- 
ing years will sweep away from this scene of ex- 
istence all who could derive pleasure from the con- 
templation of her virtues, if regarded as belonging 
to herself alone, without looking to the source from 
whence they were derived. 

But in the example of her whose character is here 
faintly delineated, we witness the actings of a spirit 
freely given to all men, according to their several 
necessities; under the influence of which each may 
attain to an equally faithful discharge of the duties 
belonging to the position to which they have been 
assigned. To every soul on the face of the earth 
the Creator of this earth, and the Originator of that 



X PREFACE. 

soul has committed a part in the working out of 
the great plan, for the accomplishment of which 
the whole has been devised ; and in the faithful 
performance of this part consists the duty of that 
soul. The allotments are various, "all have not 
the same office;" each is responsible only for its 
own part. Yet " in all worketh that one and the 
self-same spirit, dividing to every man severally as 
He will." 

It has been the aim of the editor, in preparing 
this little volume, to exhibit the principles by which 
Miss Mercer was influenced, and to prove, by her 
example, the sufficiency of those principles to direct 
in the path of duty, and to support under all trials 
which may be incident to it, in order thereby to 
direct others to the same source of consolation, by 
which her soul was sustained under trials so abound- 
ing, and to the same principle by which she was 
animated to efforts so great and persevering; — a 
principle so powerful as to enable her to declare in 
the midst of all her trials, that she found " more 
true enjoyment in the consciousness of the occupa- 
tion of her powers in the service of her Redeemer, 
than she had ever known as the daughter of afflu- 
ence, nurtured in the lap of indulgence." 

In addition to this general object, it has been the 
special design to elevate in the estimation of the 
public, so far as the influence of this work may 
reach, the position of teacher. Various circum- 
stances compel us to depute to others the task of 



PREFACE. XI 

training the affections of the heart and developing 
the powers of the intellect of our offspring. This 
is the chief duty allotted to man, and he deserves 
well of his country who has trained a family of vir- 
tuous children, leading them through the tempta- 
tions of youth, and starting them in the career of 
manhood with sound principles and well-established 
habits. How important then does it become that 
those to whom w T e intrust the entire or the supple- 
mentary care of our children should be themselves 
possessed of elevated principles, refined tastes, and 
correct habits. To secure the devotion of those 
possessed of these requirements, to this holy office, 
it is necessary that the office itself should be en- 
dowed with that respectability in the estimation of 
the public to which it is entitled ; and nothing will 
more effectually secure this than the self-dedication 
of women such as Margaret Mercer to that high 
calling. Too often it has been undertaken from 
mere mercenary motives, with a view to the ulti- 
mate pecuniary advantage, or resorted to under the 
pressure of necessity, and pursued with unwilling 
effort, rather than holy zeal. Many in both classes 
have undoubtedly proved able teachers, and sent 
forth pupils well educated for the discharge of their 
duties in life. Miss Mercer had a higher aim: de- 
siring not only to prepare her pupils for the life 
that now is, but to instil into them at the same time 
prinicples which should prepare them for glory and 



Xll PREFACE. 

honour and immortality in that which is to come; 
and to accomplish this purpose, she laboured with a 
degree of the same feeling which caused the apostle 
to regard himself as " debtor to Greek and barba- 
rian." She thus magnified her office, and the de- 
sire to elevate it in the estimation of her sex, and 
to incite others to emulate her zeal, has been a pro- 
minent object in this work. 

The subject which next to this most absorbed 
her attention and interested her feelings, was the 
condition of the negro race in this country. It 
will be found that on this she felt warmly and acted 
decidedly ; and the attention of all interested is re- 
spectfully solicited to the exhibition of her views 
here made, in as succinct a manner as is compatible 
with the importance it possessed in her own mind. 
During the passage of these sheets through the 
press, a friend to whose inspection they were sub- 
mitted, expressed the apprehension that they were 
too lenient to slavery. Others doubtless will re- 
gard them as intemperate in the denunciation of that 
institution. In this, as on every other point, the 
desire of the author has been to present himself as 
little as possible ; but lest he should be misunder- 
stood, he may be permitted to assert that, with the 
subject of the memoir herself, he can honestly adopt 
the language of the poet, and declare, 

"1 had much rather be myself the slave, 
And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him." 



A MEMOIR 



MISS MARGARET MERCER. 



The family of Mercer is one of those scions of 
an ancient stock, which, transplanted to this country 
at an early period after its first colonization, has 
flourished with renewed vigour in its new soil, and 
added lustre here to the eminence it had acquired 
in its former location. In each succeeding genera- 
tion it has possessed representatives who acted well 
their part, and left the impress of their character on 
the times in which they lived. It is needless here 
to enter into any detail of their history. The object 
in view is simply to prove that Miss Mercer sprang 
from no ignoble stem; and whether we look to the 
camp, the senate, or the social circle, in either 
sphere of action she could boast of distinguished 
progenitors, as well in Great Britain as in this 
country. Yet, to appropriate the language of the 
Bishop of Oxford, it was not for gentle alliance that 
Margaret Mercer was the most remarkable and best 



14 A MEMOIR 

deserves remembrance. Rather did she add dis- 
tinction to her honourable line, and transmit to her 
kindred of succeeding generations that memory of 
her virtues and inheritance of good deeds without 
which titles and hereditary rank are but splendid 
contradictions and conspicuous blemishes.* 

The father of Miss Mercer was a Virginian, the 
intimate friend and associate of Jefferson, Madison, 
and Monroe. His brothers and himself had all par- 
taken of the perils and toils of the war of the Revo- 
lution, and he subsequently was elected to represent 
the district in which he resided in the Congress of 
the United States. 

Having married Miss Sprigg, the daughter of 
Richard Sprigg, Esq., of Strawberry Hill, near 
Annapolis, and becoming possessed, in her right, 
of an extensive landed estate at West River, he 
removed from Virginia to that neighbourhood. 
He was one of the delegates from the State of Mary- 
land to the Convention for the formation of the Con- 
stitution of the United States, and took a very lead- 
ing part in the proceedings of that body, and was sub- 
sequently elected Governor. This led to his resi- 
dence in Annapolis, where Miss Mercer was born in 
the year 1791, and where her earlier years were 
passed. After the expiration of his gubernatorial 
term, he withdrew to his estate at Cedar Park, where 
he devoted himself to agricultural pursuits and the 
* Vide Memoir of Mrs. Godolphin. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 15 

training of his children. Governor Mercer was a 
gentleman of excellent education and refined taste, 
and had profited largely by his intercourse with the 
world; and it was his great delight to communicate 
to his daughter the advantages he had himself en- 
joyed. Her education was conducted under his 
immediate observation, and with but little assistance 
from other teachers; indeed her own remark was, 
that she had been " brought up at her father's feet." 
He took pleasure in watching and aiding the deve- 
lopment of her intellectual powers, and cultivating 
her taste; and some letters and papers which she 
had piously preserved, prove his high qualifications 
for such a task. They exhibit a mind of the same 
mould as that in which her own was formed. 

Of her earlier years little need be said. Beautiful, 
accomplished, and occupying a high social position, 
she entered upon life with the brightest prospects 
before her, and for a time participated in the usual 
amusements and occupations of the period and 
circle in which she moved. But though fre- 
quently repairing to Annapolis, then boasting a 
society of an unusually elevated order, to Balti- 
more, Washington, Alexandria, and the public wa- 
tering places, the greater part of her time was 
passed in the beautiful seclusion of Cedar Park, 
where she enjoyed the advantage of a large and 
well-selected library, the proof of the taste and 
liberality of her ancestors, and was surrounded by 



16 A MEMOIR 

a circle of neighbours, whose cultivated intellects 
and elevated feelings made them especially conge- 
nial to her own character. There are few sections 
of our own, or any other country, can boast a so- 
ciety of greater refinement and intelligence than 
that with which she here associated. Her natural 
temperament was excitable and imaginative; in 
later life, speaking of the effect produced upon her 
by reading The Abbot, she writes: "I have given 
up Cullen and every thing else like reading, for three 
weeks past, to the cares of domestic perplexities; 
but I found a night to give to the sorrows of my 
childhood's favourite, the lovely Mary Stuart. I 
enter perfectly into the old Scotchman's feelings, in 
Zelucco, who fought so valiantly in defence of her 
memory. I always get up and leave the room, now, 
when any one speaks disrespectfully of her. If she 
had only been firm about marrying Both well! 
When I was a child, the summit of my ambition 
was to have been one of those maids who attended 
on her in captivity. To have kissed the hem of her 
garment, and received one sad smile, would have 
broken my heart with delight and sorrow." 

One transient glimpse at the habits and feelings 
of this period of her life is afforded us as we pass, 
as it were, in the following extract from a lecture to 
young ladies on the subject of patience, exhibiting 
a beautiful illustration of her early dedication to 
the good work of binding up the broken-hearted, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 17 

ministering consolation to the afflicted, and seeking 
protection for the oppressed, so peculiarly the pro- 
vince of female effort " One of the happiest in- 
fluences I ever experienced from human example, 
was at that period of my life, when, carried along 
by the tide of fashion and folly, I spent my winters 
in the city, in the restless and unsatisfying search for 
pleasure, in which are universally engaged 

* The gay licentious crowd, 
They who their thoughtless hours in giddy mirth, 
In wanton, oft in cruel riot, waste ;' 

and returned, in the summer, to the country to brood 
over fancied cares, and i listless, drone the joyless 
hours away.' In a wood, close by the river's brink, 
stood an old hovel, into which the piercing wind, 
as it swept along the surface of the stream, found 
entrance through every board. There, lived an old 
fisherman with his wife and five children. The 
man was utterly unprincipled. He drank, and when 
he had taken but a small portion of liquor, he was 
apparently kind and good-humoured; but he, like 
every other habitual drunkard, never could cease 
drinking, until, overpowered by excess, he would 
sink down to slumber away the effects of his intem- 
perance, and w r ake up a surly, passionate brute. 
His wife was a gentle, patient, unoffending being. 
For twenty years she had suffered all that mere 
bodily ill could inflict; she had been subject to ab- 
scesses, by which almost every joint in her frame 

2* 



1 ^ A MEMOIR 

bad been started from their s ::kets 9 and rendered 
inflexible. He: Located, her elb: 

even her fingers, were ed, and scarred; 

for in all the joints of her hands s::e had the = 
imp: 5 winter she d iy a 

return of nvaa attended 

severest chills; 5; that when with every end::, in 
11 jomfortable dw rliiuirs.we cc add scar :eiy, ::.;:;nf 
ing and d :n is poor dis- 

eased creature p her wretched bed 

all the rigors of congestive ague. She had 
never been d . ::unh her features were 

delicate, and her eyes blue, clear, and soft; out her 
, ' :::;:de:::: :. "d'.::n .n :. : n:: naturally fair, was 
dyed of the most sallow hue. I visited her fre- 
nly. and res;:e:n;d her u: i::g piety 

and her industry \ 5 managed to sew an. nan: 

with her stin an nibs. I respected her 

desire to bring; up her chile en religiously, and her 
unvarying patience with her unworthy husband. 
One dai vhen I had known her for years win 
her ever having uttered a murmurd she sent for 
me: she no longer eve:: atte : r. as she 

had been accustomed to, across her cabin floor, but 
dressed by her ^ : . she was placed by her son 

in her c — s se :.:. in whin she sat knitting all 

the day. Her eye- led from weakness, so 

: comfort of rea : 
common print oi her cheap Bible. When I 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 19 

took my seat by her, she burst into tears; and now 
the burden of her heart was discovered. Her hus- 
band had grown more and more intemperate, her 
boys were growing up, and she could not see him 
destroy his own soul, and endanger theirs by his 
vicious example, without remonstrance. But in- 
stead-of listening to her, he had even struck her, and 
often threatened to put her to death, that he might 
be relieved from the burden of maintaining such a 
helpless, useless creature. She had reason to fear 
for her life; and she thought it had become a duty 
to disclose the truth, that he might be prevented 
from committing such a crime. He was her hus- 
band, he had once been kind to her, and it grieved 
her heart to expose him; but she dared not conceal 
his conduct any longer. She did not fear to die, 
but a death of violence, by her husband's hand, was 
too horrible to think of. I wept with her, but gently 
endeavoured to turn her thoughts to the consolations 
of religion, when I beheld a mild beam irradiating 
her pale face; and looking intently before her, as if 
her thoughts were passing directly forward into 
another and a better world, she said, i Oh yes, Miss 
Margaret, I often think there is no one in the 
world who has so much, to be thankful to God for 
as I have/ I gazed at her in surprise and silence, 
when she earnestly and slowly added, ' to think how 
much trouble He has brought me through/ I re- 
turned home that day with a new spirit within me; 



20 A MEMOIR 

and whenever since I have been disposed to com- 
plain of my lot, I have remembered that lowly saint. 
I sent her a soft and comfortable couch which I had 
just made to lounge on myself, with a large Testa- 
ment, and prohibited her brutal husband from 
coming on the estate. But for twelve long years 
she had still to toil through the tribulation of the 
saints, before the Lord saw that patience had per- 
fected her work, and then He took her to everlast- 
ing rest in the bosom of light, life, and immortality. 
Ye w T ho are fretting daily at every trifling vexation, 
remember Mary Tucker, and ' in your patience pos- 
sess ye your souls/ " 

It is not known at what period, or by what cir- 
cumstances her mind was first led to the adoption 
of those religious views, which exerted so important 
an influence on her character, and made her so pe- 
culiar an object of interest. In after life she spoke 
of the change as the gradual development of a prin- 
ciple, the first unfoldings of which were scarce per- 
ceptible, and the earliest record found of them is in 
a letter written during her attendance upon the sick 
bed of a maternal aunt, to whom she was warmly 
attached, and whose Christian character doubtless 
had some influence in the formation of that of the 
niece. The letter is without date, but must have 
been written prior to the year IS 14, to a friend in 
Essex County, Virginia, It was in reply to one 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 21 

containing some reference to her supposed gratifica- 
tion in the usual enjoyments of youth. 

" How different, my sweetest Coz., has been my 
occupation for the last month from that you ima- 
gine; shut up in a sick house, watching the turns of 
disease that has threatened to deprive me of the best 

friend I have on earth And now let me 

ask you to rejoice with me that I have hopes of 
seeing my adored aunt restored to health. Thank 
Heaven, she is something better; for days she has 
been despaired of, but the Almighty heard our ear- 
nest prayer. I found her looking the image of my 
sainted mother, when, for the last few days, the 
troubled spirit seemed to have taken refuge with 
her God, her eyes glazed and vacant — but, merciful 
Father, I thank thee that thou hast not withdrawn 

this model from our imitation Last night I had 

such a golden dream about going to Essex, but the 
town clock awakened me on the road. I do think 
that if you had a church, it would be a heavenly 
place. I could cry, whenever I recollect that there 
is no church for such dear good people to collect in 
and offer their thanks to Heaven for being so blest. 
I was confirmed, and had the pious blessing of our 
venerable old Bishop the day before I came from 
home. You cannot think how humble, how peni- 
tent, how happy I feel. It seems as though I still 
feel the pressure of his hand on my head. He has 



22 A MEMOIR 

promised to come to see me next spring I do 

not think I was ever made for a married woman; I 
feel as if I was not intended to take so great a share 
in worldly things. If I did, I should forget my 
God. perhaps: and may Providence load me with 
every human misery, and deprive me of every earth- 
ly good rather than that. How I am wandering! 
but vou will forgive me for following the train of 
my thoughts; had I forced them. I should have been 
affected/' Such were the first ruddy dawnings of 
that spiritual life which was yearly more and more 
developed, until it shone bright, and clear, to the 
glory of Him, who had thus begun a good work in 
her, to be perfected only when, after forty years of 
earthly trial, she was taken to the rest prepared for 
His people. Its influence was ever on the increase, 
bringing into subjection, and appropriating to hea- 
venly uses, every faculty of her mind and every 
feeling of her heart. The light of divine truth was 
with her, as it ever must be, like that of the mate- 
rial w T orld, shining more and more to the perfect 
day. Faint as may be its beginning, cold and gray 
in some, warm and rich in its colouring in others, 
dark as may be the clouds that hang around its 
dawning, or gather about its ascending path, its al- 
lotted course is ever onward and upward, till, the in- 
fluences of earth triumphantly overcome, it finds its 
full development in a state of existence free from 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 2o 

those mists and vapours which sin has cast arounu 
us here. 

It was just prior to this period of her life, that 
Miss Mercer made a visit to her paternal relatives 
in Essex County, Virginia. To these relatives she 
formed an attachment of unusual strength. Found- 
ed on congeniality of character, built up by a per- 
petual interchange of acts of kindness, and cemented 
by entire unity in religious feelings, it continued to 
increase in strength till it was shattered by the hand 
of that power before which all earthly things must 
bow, and which terminates, for the time, at least, 
even the holiest ties. 

One of these relatives, Miss Hunter, of Hunter's 
Hill, has furnished a sketch of her estimate of Miss 
Mercer, which will be drawn on freely in the course 
of this memoir. Referring to this period, she says: 
" Miss Mercer's first visit to Virginia, after she had 
passed the period of childhood, was made at that 
time of life when the girl has passed into the woman, 
and the distinctive peculiarities of mind, character, 
and manners are strikingly developed. Her rela- 
tives formed a very extensive connexion, embracing, 
of course, persons of every variety of age and dis- 
position; yet her endearing qualities, the peculiar 
charm and interest of her manner and conversation, 
her strong and affectionate feeling of the ties of kin- 
dred, at once produced sentiments of tenderness in 
the hearts of many, which became friendship lasting 



24 A MEMOIR 

as life itself, excited the admiration of all, and gave 
rise in the younger portion of the connexion to an 
enthusiasm bordering almost on idolatry. Her suc- 
ceeding visits but deepened the impression made by 
the first; they were anticipated with delight, and 
regarded as bright eras in life. Her looks, her 
words, her acts of love were treasured in the me- 
mory of her friends, and they felt that they had 
lived more during one week, in her society, than 
in ten times that period passed in the ordinary rou- 
tine of life. Her mind and heart were always 
awake, and always active in stimulating the intel- 
lectual energies of others, and kindling in their 
hearts the flame of noble and generous feeling, and 
awakening high aspirations for excellence. It was 
always a subject of admiration and surprise to those 
who knew her, how far her spiritual could triumph 
over her physical nature; her nervous organization 
was one of peculiar delicacy, and her sufferings, 
even at this period, were often very severe. Yet 
when reduced to a condition in which ordinary per- 
sons would have been incapable of acting, if an ap- 
peal were made to her affection or her sense of duty, 
her energies were wont to arouse in a most astonish- 
ing manner, and incite her to efforts greatly beyond 
her strength/' Thus early was exhibited that frail- 
ty of bodily health which she never surmounted, 
and which enhanced the value of all her subsequent 
efforts. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 25 

In personal appearance, Miss Mercer was pecu- 
liarly attractive; her stature was originally tall, her 
carriage graceful, her eye beaming with intelligence, 
and her whole countenance expressive of the love- 
liest traits of female character. Disease and care 
set their marks upon her face in after life, and 
caused her form to lose its symmetry, but never 
quenched the beaming of the eye, nor darkened the 
radiance of her soul, which shone on every feature to 
the very last. Her appearance was indeed the im- 
bodiment of the ideal of female loveliness and worth ; 
and it may be asserted with safety, that none ever 
approached her without receiving the impression of 
the presence of one elevated above the common 
grade of mortal life. There was a combination of 
the attractive graces with the impressiveness of su- 
perior power which is rarely met with; and while 
her manner was often sportive, and she could adorn 
the most common subjects of conversation by the 
most graceful turns of thought and purity of lan- 
guage, there was frequently an elevation of thought 
and force of expression, which carried those thrown 
into association with her, into a higher sphere than 
that of common every-day existence. Even those 
who could not sympathize with and appreciate 
her character, were still struck with this feature 
in it, and its influence was acknowledged in the 
fact, that none would dare to express before her 
sentiments or opinions which would have been 
3 



26 A MEMOIR 

uttered in conversation with other persons with- 
out hesitation. There was something about her 
w r hich enkindled in the bosom of all a desire to 
partake of her good opinion; and when in after 
life she entered upon the discharge of the task of 
instruction, the apprehension of a frown from Miss 
Mercer, was sufficient to check even the thought- 
lessness of youth. Nor was this a mere evanes- 
cent impression, as her pupils have been known 
to declare, that long after they passed from under 
her authority, the sense of her approbation or con- 
demnation of their course, exerted a powerful influ- 
ence for restraint or encouragement. 

Educated in a section of country abounding in 
varied scenes of surpassing loveliness, and surround- 
ed, at her immediate home, by views possessed of 
great natural beauty and improved by high cultiva- 
tion, her taste, originally good, became refined by 
these circumstances of elegance. Her perception 
of the beauties of nature was very quick, and she 
possessed high powers as an artist. Her flower- 
painting was almost unrivalled. There was a truth- 
fulness and grace of drawing, a delicacy and perfec- 
tion of colouring, and a power of combination and 
arrangement, which bespoke talent of the highest 
order in this branch of art, which she was ever 
ready to turn to account, either for the gratification 
of her friends, or as a means of contributing to the 
promotion of objects of benevolence. 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 21 

One of the earliest and most persistent traits of 
her character was an entire self-abandonment. It 
was more than is expressed by the want of selfish- 
ness, this is but a negative virtue; with Miss Mer- 
cer, it was the positive sacrifice of self for the benefit 
of others; and even at the early period of her life, 
now under notice, this trait was sufficiently deve- 
loped to form a decided feature in the portrait of 
her mind. Thus Miss Hunter, whose opportunities 
of observation commenced at an early period of her 
life, and were continued, without interruption, and 
extended to the most intimate confidence, even to 
the end, remarks: "It might be said of her, without 
fear of exaggerated eulogy, that she lived for others, 
and never appeared to be actuated by any motive of 
personal interest, comfort, or convenience." And 
this observation is equally true, whether applied to 
the daily trifling events which afford an opportunity 
for the exhibition of the state of the affections to 
those by whom we are surrounded, and which con- 
stitute the sum of human happiness or misery, or 
to those greater actions which require a more posi- 
tive effort of exertion. There was a grace in the 
manner in which her kindness was performed, which 
removed from the receiver the oppressive sense of 
obligation. These were the native instincts of her 
heart; and sanctified and elevated as they were by 
the influence of the Spirit of God, they rendered 
her a living example of every grace. 



28 A MEMOIR 

Her literary taste was highly cultivated, and her 
mind having been formed on a correct model, by 
early familiarity with the best authors of our own 
language and of France, she was able to criticise 
the passing literature of the day with great propri- 
ety. Much of her earlier correspondence is thus 
occupied, and exhibits a sound judgment and cor- 
rect discrimination of the beauties and imperfections 
of the works which came under her notice. Yet 
was she never beguiled by the beauty of language, 
or force of expression, into an admiration of that 
which was untrue or of evil influence. Her mind 
shrunk with instinctive abhorrence from that most 
hateful of all the exhibitions of evil, in which it is 
clothed in the attractiveness with which misapplied 
genius can adorn it. As the dazzling scales and the 
varied hue of its covering but enhance the feeling of 
aversion, with which nature shrinks from the enve- 
nomed serpent, so the pure soul turns with the more 
intense loathing and disgust from those fearful ex- 
hibitions of the depth of human iniquity, in which 
the very lights and ornaments of God's own truth 
are perverted to conceal the deadly poison of soul- 
destroying error. Thus, in writing to a friend, she 
says: "Lara is certainly by Byron. Mr. Dallas, the 
secretary of Gallatin, saw it in manuscript whilst 
he was writing at Ghent. It is not equal to much 
that he has written, but I think it shows great genius. 
He is quite a Salvator Rosa in the terribly sublime; 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 29 

but I was so disgusted with Childe Harold, that I am 
not free from prejudice on the subject. I cannot 
bear the black, gloomy, desperate wretch, who sinks 
under the oppression of this world. The soul, des- 
tined for eternity, should rise superior to the shores 
of time. You will say these remarks apply to the 
man; but do you not agree with me in thinking that 
\\\sown soul is the original from which all his delinea- 
tions are made. I have been more enchanted with 
the Queen's Wake of Hogg, than any thing that I 
have seen. It is not very original, at least it con- 
tains much that may be considered as plagiarism, 
yet it is beautiful and almost miraculous, consider- 
ing the circumstances." Writing again to the same 
friend, she resumes the subject: "I am sorry you 
think me too hard on your friend Byron. His 
genius I admire certainly, but surely you will admit 
he makes a bad use of his powers. Recollect those 
lines of Childe Harold, 

1 Poor child of darkness and of death, 
Whose hope is built on reeds.' 

What a sentiment ! Thomas says, eloquently, in 
French, that the infidel looks in vain around him 
for arguments against Providence. Every blade of 
grass confutes him, and he is forced to retire into 
his own black heart, where alone the gloomy chaos 
exists. So I fear poor Byron must form his ideas 
of fate from contemplating himself, and doubt the 

3* 



30 A MEMOIR 

existence of a God, because he cannot perceive His 
hand in the composition of his own soul. I hate to 
be uncharitable, but the man who so boldly steps 
forward to defy the powers above, has no need of 
my indulgence; I must despise his heartless insensi- 
bility in not feeling that there is a great and good 
God, and I must abhor the malice that would induce 
a man to spread an infectious disease which torments 
himself. This is my defence." 

In like manner she criticises the style, concep- 
tion, and moral influence of Scott's works as they 
issued, and other productions of the press. 

Her character comprised elements apparently very 
diverse, and yet all combined into a perfect whole, 
as the varied colours in the ray of light. Gentle, 
and full of affection for all, and ready to sympathize 
with sorrow wherever met w T ith, feelings, the evi- 
dence of which will be found scattered every where 
around these traces of her path through life, she yet 
possessed an energy and firmness rarely found in 
this connexion. The circumstances detailed in the 
following extract from a letter written to one of her 
Essex relatives, will exhibit a degree of courage and 
energy which few possess. 

"I am afraid, my dearest cousin, that you have all 
been out of patience before my letters reached you; 
but I cannot, in conscience, lay the blame of my 
silence on the mails. I was so sick, so harassed 
with the sickness and troubles of others, or 'mine 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 31 

ain,' that I did not put pen to paper for nearly four 
weeks, and when I did, it was with an invincible 
apathy, which chilled every current of thought or 
feeling. Since that I have been roused, by a rat- 
tling peal of thunder, from the sleep which had do- 
minion over my spirits. I wrote to you that I was 
alone at West River; my brother had left me to put 
himself under medical care; I was staying by my- 
self, with little Tommy, thinking too much of my 
brother and Richard Stuart, who had been ill for 
four weeks, when a violent commotion broke out 
in the family; and like the savage whose indolence 
explodes at the war whoop, (as the concussion of a 
pistol dissipates a noxious vapour,) I started from 
my inanity, and appeared, with the fury of an in- 
spired pythoness, the savage intrepidity of Helen 
M'Gregor, the despotic pride of Queen Elizabeth, 
when the spirit of Harry the Eighth rose within 
her. I declare to you, that when I found myself in 
the midst of the negroes, after their having used the 
greatest violence towards the overseer, when they 
were seizing him and holding him with every de- 
monstration of rage, I did not know myself. I felt 
ten feet high, and as if the strongest man on the 
place would have been an infant in strength to me. 
I declare I believe in the Indian philosopher's ac- 
count of the creation and distribution of souls; and 
that by some caprice of the winds, the soul of some 
Indian chief was wafted into the feeble frame of a 



32 A MEMOIR 

poor sickly little girl, and has been educated, and 

educated in vain, to make it suitable to its condition 

in life. I had well nigh gone off like a sky-rocket 

for you know, 

• This fiery soul is working out its way — 
It o'er informs the tenement of clay, 
And frets the pigmy body to decay.'" 

I had completely curbed the spirit, and, I verily be- 
lieve, saved the shedding of blood, when, just as I 
had sunk into the consequent weakness of nerve 
and feeling, my aunt and Mr. Law, having heard, 
accidentally, of the circumstance, came down and 
brought me here." 

Thus in mock heroic did she attempt to veil an 
action requiring such true heroism as few females 
are endowed with. In the same strain, at another 
time, she describes a similar, though less perilous 
effort. " I must tell you of an adventure I had the 
other night. Some ragamuffin, thinking that all the 
family were from home, I suppose, came and at- 
tempted to break into the house per force, but I 
threw up the window and frightened him so that he 
fell down dead like Falstaff, and all my soliloquies 
could not rouse him, till I left the window and went 
to call the servants — when, like his valiant proto- 
type, he rose and retreated with all expedition." 
Her admiration of cool, determined moral courage 
was very great. Thus, soon after the close of the 
war of 1812, she writes: "The President and Cabi- 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 33 

net spent two days with us last week. Tell your 
mamma that the old gentleman won my heart, en- 
tirely by some traits of feeling that I did not expect 
from him, and propitiated me entirely for Mrs. M. 
by a story he told for her. Mr. Calhoun, who was 
with him, is one of the greatest men I ever saw. 
Papa is perfectly enraptured with his mind and man- 
ners; and there were others, and among those others 
was one — but I will say nothing of a hero who pro- 
voked a battery to fire on him, and then walked 
slowly backward to notice the range of their fire. 
I will not say what I thought of such a man on in- 
timate acquaintance."* Upon another occasion she 

says: " Twenty letters, my dearest , in which 

there was not one word I could frame an exception 
to, would not prove so certain a stimulus to my pen 
as a difference of opinion, especially if that difference 
involved the character of a favourite. I am strongly- 
bent on defending my friend Edward, and if I have 
a tolerably correct recollection of The Monastery, it 
will not prove beyond even my limited skill to 
frame a defence for him. I wish the Queen of Eng- 
land's cause had been as favourable to Brougham's 
talents. In the first place, I admit you are perfectly 
correct as to the importance of courage in the cha- 
racter of a man, that there is nothing atones for the 
want of it — that, in fact, there is no virtue without 
it; but, my dear coz., there are as many shades and 
* Col. McCrea, of North Carolina. 



34 A MEMOIR 

grades in the qualities of courage, as in any thing 
else belonging to the ever-varying condition of hu- 
man life. Now that animal bravery which your 
friend Halbert possessed in common with the house- 
breaker, the mail-robber, the privateer's-man, the 
wolf, and the bear, is, in my opinion, nearly as un- 
favourable and adverse to the formation of the noble 
and generous magnanimity of moral courage, as the 
wisdom of this world is often opposed to the wis- 
dom which comes from God. If moral courage 
should be grafted on animal courage successfully, 
doubtless the strength of the stock will improve the 
character of the fruit. But unfortunately the animal 
principle is a rude wild growth which can scarcely 
be led through the delicate veins of the more per- 
fect plant; but rather shooting its unprofitable and 
eccentric vigour into thorny and fruitless branches, 
leaves the graft to perish, and the disappointed gar- 
dener to grieve over his lost time and care. I have 
a very indifferent memory; indeed principles, not 
men, have been the chief employment of my mind. 
But I think Edward, in several instances, proved 
that the energy of his mind was more than equal 
to counterbalance the weakness of his nerves. He 
loved Mary next to high heaven, and before himself; 
but he would not have followed a spirit which he 
had some misgiving was the devil, as Halbert did, 
into another world. As for his hatred of Halbert, 
it was a slander. The generous feelings which were 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 35 

roused by the supposed murder of his brother were 
natural to his quiet and Christian spirit, where strong 
earthly passions are only kept down and regulated 
by stronger heavenly ones, and quiet, meek humility 
arises from the mortifying sense of the strength of 
rebellious nature. 

"Moral courage, or that dignified constancy of 
mind which alone deserves our admiration, is like 
the sublime, better defined by examples than de- 
scription. A young man of very delicate health 
was observed by one of your ferocious, merciless 
desperadoes to tremble in battle. ' What, sir V said 
the man of animal courage, with contemptuous re- 
proach, i you are a coward — you are afraid. I ' Yes, 
sir/ said the young man calmly; < and had you been 
as much afraid, you would have run away long ago.' 
Dr. John Hunter was very fond of a menagerie of 
wild beasts. He had two fine young tigers, which, 
as they grew, became so ferocious with their strength 
that even the keeper dared hardly appear at the 
cage to feed them. By some unfortunate accident 
they escaped. Every one fled in the greatest terror, 
and alarm was spread around; no one dared to at- 
tempt taking them, when Dr. H. walked firmly up 
to them, took hold of their collars, led them into 
their cage; and when he had fastened the door, and 
all was safe, he fell dead on the spot.* But the 

* Miss Mercer was in error in this statement Dr. Hunter fainted, 
but lived many years after this event. 



36 A MEMOIR 

nerves of our desperate and detestable neighbour, 
the Guinea Captain, so distinguished for his daunt- 
less ferocity in privateering, formed no element in 
the composition of the magnanimous courage of Dr. 
Hunter. I read an anecdote of a Quaker in whom 
the moral and animal courage were finely united, 
although I cannot say but that my " Friend's" prin- 
ciples were a little sophisticated. During the French 
war he found himself a passenger in a ship which 
came to a severe conflict with a French vessel. 
Nothing said could induce the man of peace to take 
the slightest interest in the battle, though he quietly 
w T alked the deck as the balls flew around him. At 
last the French, getting the advantage, grappled and 
boarded, or attempted to board; for the first man 
that leaped on the deck, the Quaker sprang forward, 
and seizing with a powerful grasp, said deliberately, 
c Friend, thou hast no business here/ and flung him 
into the sea; which so animated the crew that they 
succeeded in beating off the enemy, and escaped. 
Now this is my idea of true courage, and I think Ed- 
ward possessed it. That certain, just, and elevated 
moral principles should be so powerfully, so clearly 
established as to make the observance of them para- 
mount to every other consideration in fast faith in 
God, is the only perfect courage."* 

With some of the fearful scenes of the war of 

* The reader need hardly be told that the anecdote here given is, to 
say the least, very apocryphal, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 37 

IS 12 she was painfully familiar ; being in the imme- 
diate vicinity of Baltimore at the time of the attack 
upon the city, when but for the death of General 
Ross, it would have been subjected to all the horrors 
inseparable from the presence of a hostile army. 
The following letters manifest the perfect composure 
of her mind, amid scenes well calculated to agitate 
one less susceptible than she. 

"Although we are still in suspense, I know it 
will be a great relief to you, my dear cousin, to hear 
that we are still in existence, and likely to be so, 
should the enemy have no re-enforcements. On 
Monday they landed about ten miles from town, and 
defeated about four thousand of our men, who re- 
treated to town, and were followed to the lines, about 
a mile and a half from the city, where, I suppose, 
finding our lines too formidable, they fell back, and 
are now either waiting for re-enforcements or pre- 
paring for embarkation. We have but about twenty 
thousand men. The fort affords a complete protec- 
tion from the fleet — at least, it has stood twenty-one 
hours' heavy bombardment — lost only four men 
killed, and the works not injured. They threw, we 
hear, fifteen hundred shells. I am sure this calcu- 
lation is accurate, for we saw and counted every 
one from these windows. Finding this attack in- 
effectual, and not being able to come within gun- 
shot, they have all gone down to the mouth of the 
river, and we have a little respite. George Steuart 
4 



38 A MEMOIR 

is very slightly wounded, — my brother safe, though 
very much worsted, riding day and night since the 
alarm. He joined a troop of horse immediately on 
our return from a ride we had taken for my health. 
We were at Bridgewater, Pennsylvania, where I 
was recovering very fast, when we heard the alarm, 
and pushed home to our friends. We have passed 
two horrible days and nights, but I rejoice that I 
am in the midst of them. I do not think they will 
take the town, especially if, as is universally said 
by the prisoners and deserters, Ross is killed in the 
action on Monday." A few days later, she adds: 

" I promised to write again, my ever dear cousin, 
and I should have done it the next day, had any 
thing of moment occurred ; but we have been quiet 
ever since the fleet moved off. Their attack on the 
fort was unsuccessful; they lost their General and 
several other officers on land, and there was nothing 
more to do. With the co-operation of the fleet, 
they expected to take the town and fort at the same 
time, but the bombardment failing, they were glad 
to move off, and would to heaven we were never to 
see another on this side of the ocean. All that I 
love are safe. We were within sight of every shell 
and gun; but I believe I wrote you all about it. I 
have been in such a state of confusion that I cannot 
recollect what I wrote; but Iinow that since then 
we have discovered that our state of defence is quite 
unequal to resisting ten thousand men, disciplined 



Or MISS MARGARET MERCER. 39 

as European troops are. Perhaps another week may- 
lay us all in the dust." 

She was subsequently placed in circumstances 
still more closely affecting those in whose welfare 
she was most deeply interested, and there displayed 
yet higher evidence of cool determined power of 
action in a position most likely to overwhelm the 
judgment of one whose sensibilities were so acute 
as hers. Decidedly as she expressed her admira- 
tion of courage, and capable as she was of appre- 
ciating its value, her heart was not closed to the 
gentler emotions, and at the close of the war she 
writes : " On returning home, after an absence of 
three months, 1 found an old letter from my dear 
cousin: I have indeed been very faulty, but the 
truth is, I was too unhappy till the peace, and too 
happy since, to do any thing. I was crazy for one 
day, and silly ever since. Oh, my dear cousin, 
you can scarcely form an idea of my situation ; not 
able to stay at home, and feeling like a poor exile 
every where else; looking forward to my brother's 
going to Canada immediately, and that I could not 
stand. I do not think I should ever have seen him 
again. I could not have lived through a single 
campaign — but it is all over, and we are happy 
again." 

But whilst her affections and feelings were ever 
thus excitable, there was constantly a calm under- 
current of sound practical wisdom, which kept them 



40 A MEMOIR 

within due limit in their actings, except so far as she 
allowed them to lead her, from sympathy with 
others, to disregard her own comfort or advantage. 
In early life, especially, her character partook un- 
doubtedly of a high degree of enthusiasm, and even 
in her later years the same tendency would display 
itself; but it was never permitted to lead her into 
any extravagance of action. It was indeed a health- 
ful enthusiasm, and proved a powerful incentive to 
high and holy undertakings. Her mind seemed in- 
capable of repose; it was ever in active operation, 
and in this ceaseless activity it seized upon every 
subject that presented itself with more or less tena- 
city of purpose, and devoted itself with untiring 
energy to its consideration. In the years of her 
life now immediately under our observation, botani- 
cal studies opened to her a source of great delight, 
and amid the quiet shades of Cedar Park, and the 
varied scenes of the neighbourhood, she spent day 
after day in seeking out the beautiful plants with 
which our hill-sides and meadows abound. Her love 
for flowers amounted to a passion, and the accuracy 
and elegance with which she delineated them has 
been already referred to, and exceed the belief of 
those who have never witnessed it. She was desi- 
rous of promoting the study, as healthful in its asso- 
ciated circumstances, and refining and elevating in 
its influence on the mind; and to promote this end, 
botanical cards, botanical games, and botanical dra- 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 41 

mas and verses were all produced by her prolific 
mind. It was not with her the mere philosophical 
detail of orders and genera; there was a romantic 
feeling, as of entity, connected with every plant, 
which led her to attach herself to it, as though it 
was capable of exercising reciprocal affection; and 
she sportively writes to a friend of congenial tastes 
and pursuits, "I am very busy in my botanical 
studies, and the wild flowers may look out if they 
have any reluctance to being transferred to my 
Flora. Indeed, I can hardly suspect them of such 
low desires and tastes. Think you that the passion 
of the hero, who courts death, and exults in being 
cut off in the bloom of youth, that he may be im- 
mortalized in history, may not be the inmate of 
some little flower's bright bosom, which else were 
doomed 

' To blush unseen, 
And waste its fragrance on the desert air]' 

We will have many a ramble yet in your wild 
woods, where they flourish so gayly. Do, if you 
meet w r ith any remarkable for their beauty, trans- 
plant them to some secure spot, where we may find 
them next year." At another time we find her 
apologizing for the insult offered to her natural fa- 
vourites by the "disciple of Jussieu, condescending 
to overseam calico flowers on a counterpane." At 
the close of a letter to a friend, she quotes the ori- 
ginal Hebrew of Genesis ii. 8, and says, " Do you 

4* 



42 A MEMOIR 

know what that is? < Jlnd the Lord God planted 
a garden? Let us take it for our motto, for surely 
in his very best estate we cannot imagine that God 
ever conferred a better fate on man, than when He 
planted for him a garden, and set him to dressing 
it." But it was not upon these sportive fancies 
alone that her mind exerted its powers. Graver 
subjects occupied her attention, and performed their 
part in giving increased vigour to her reasoning fa- 
culties, whilst the others were adding to the already 
abounding stores of her fertile imagination. It has 
been mentioned that she had access to a choice col- 
lection of works on history and general literature: 
these were her familiar companions, and her mind 
was thoroughly stored with their contents; whilst 
we find her sometimes deep in mathematics, allow- 
ing herself but four hours' rest in the twenty-four, 
that she might bring her mind under the wholesome 
discipline of this parent of careful thought; at others, 
theological discussions asserted an unrivalled empire 
over her mind, and in order to drink, as she sup- 
posed, more purely from the fountain itself, with 
less intervention of human teaching, she devoted 
herself with almost undivided attention to the study 
of Hebrew $* and a short time after, we find her 
carefully threading the intricate mysteries of medi- 
cal science, that by the acquisition of correct know- 
ledge on the nature of diseases and remedies, she 
might enlarge the sphere of her benevolent useful- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 43 

ness. The deep abstractions of metaphysics did not 
deter her from trying to fathom those abysses into 
which the mind plunges its line in vain, growing 
old in drawing up no certain token of reaching the 
solid foundation over which its deep waters roll so 
proudly. She remarks to a friend : " I do not come 
on very well with metaphysics ; I dislike any thing 
so inconclusive, and should be tired of following an 
angel, if he talked so in a ring." A paper of 
"Thoughts on the Magnet" proves her to have 
given attention to natural philosophy, and at an 
early period to have attempted to solve some of 
those mysterious truths which are now but dawning 
upon the horizon of human knowledge. But whilst 
on all these subjects she could express herself with 
ease and eloquence, there was a simplicity and deli- 
cacy about her character which separated her as 
widely as can be conceived from that class of" wo- 
men of masculine understanding," whose assump- 
tion of claims to superiority over their own sex leads 
them to despise the refinements and delicacy which 
communicate an appropriate and attractive grace to 
the female character. These can never be laid aside, 
no matter how great the positive acquirement, with- 
out a violation of the laws of nature, and a conse- 
quent shock to that unity of action which constitutes 
the beauty of the works of Him, who gave to each 
an appropriate part in the sublime harmony of the 
universe, which attests His wisdom and power. 



44 A MEMOIR 

Never was feminine grace more beautifully illus- 
trated than in her whole career. She never forgot 
that it is the peculiar province of woman to minister 
to the comfort, and promote the happiness, first, of 
those most nearly allied to her, and then of those, 
who by the providence of God are placed in a state 
of dependence upon her. To discharge these duties 
was her unceasing object, to the accomplishing 
which she devoted herself with entire singleness of 
purpose. Thus she writes to a friend: "I, like 
every little mole toiling in his own dark passage, 
have been given to murmuring, and my great com- 
plaint for some time past has been, that I was cut 
off from every means of usefulness, and could not 
find any thing on earth to do that might not as well 
remain undone; and while I am fretting at having 
nothing to do, you find equal discomfort in having 
too much. Somebody, no matter who, has said the 
secret of happiness was that the busy find leisure, 
and the idle find business, and it would seem so be- 
tween us. And yet I doubt whether happiness is 
not a principle which belongs exclusively to God, 
and whether we can ever be satisfied till we wake 
up in his likeness. Whenever you can find that 
spot, sacred to religious peace and true friendship, 
send for me to your paradise, but remember this is 
the reward promised to those who have gone 
through the struggle of our great spiritual war- 
fare. " 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 45 

At this time her pencil, her pen, and her needle 
were all put in requisition in aid of the Greeks in 
their struggle for liberty. Miss Hunter remarks, 
''Love was with her the fulfilling of the law. At 
the very time she thus speaks of herself as having 
nothing to do that was worth doing, w T e find her en- 
gaged in comforting, assisting, and cheering all who 
came within the sphere of her influence ; now ac- 
tively employed in the Sunday-School; now aiding 
the Greek cause, and the Conization Society with 
the fanciful productions of her pencil, or exquisite 
needle-work, and stimulating the moral and intel- 
lectual energies of the youthful portion of her 
friends." Thus she wrote to a friend and relative 
at this time. 
My dear , 

I have business for you — no less than to write an 
African tale for the Colonization Society. Will you 
begin forthwith? My idea is to show the advan- 
tages with which Christianity invests the savage. 
First, to open with the description of a little girl 
sporting in the woods, rolling her cocoa-nuts, and 
throwing her oranges, and dancing under every 
palm tree, with long wreaths of flowers; send her 
bounding home in the evening, and as she ap- 
proaches the house, under the cover of a screen of 
bushes, let her be suddenly arrested by the disco- 
very of a party of slave-dealers, in close treaty with 
her mother, who, decorated in gaudy beads and red 



46 A MEMOIR 

flannel, should be heard to exclaim, I will give my 
little girl for them, if you wait until she comes in 
from play. At this, send the little heroine back to 
the woods to spend the night; let her creep into an 
excavated bank to sleep, after wandering in the 
dusk, where she alternates all the terrors which now 
the fear of lions and tigers, now the imagination of 
being pursued by her mother and the white man 
create; let her hear her mother's voice calling her, 
and the rustling of the leaves that conceal her from 
view; and on the next day let her be joined by a 
little companion — a boy some years older — who has 
been searching for her, in terror of her having been 
destroyed by the wild beasts; let her at first dread 
to discover herself to him, but at last, moved and en- 
couraged by his expressions of anxiety for her fate, 
let her come from her hiding-place, and throw her- 
self on his affection and compassion: let him save 
her by guiding her far up into the interior to some 
old grandmother, who is to adopt them both, with- 
out knowing the whole truth; but when they are 
grown, let her be brought forcibly back to her mo- 
ther, let him come back rather than desert her — then 
let the crime be accomplished, and throw them both 
into a slave vessel, and describe the prison deck, 
then the punishments to prevent them drowning 
themselves; let them, on a fine bright day, meet the 
Leon, and hear the wretched crew lamenting the 
awful judgment which has come upon them; let our 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 47 

hero and heroine be only saved from suicide by their 
affection for each other, and after going through the 
horrors of the voyage, from cruelty, disease, and 
despair, land them, and let them be purchased to- 
gether by an American Christian visiting the West 
Indies — a Quaker, if you please — and after her 
meeting with her cruel mother in slavery, and pre- 
vailing on the Quaker to relieve her from the highly 
contrasted missies of her situation; let them all 
come to the United States, and end by going home 
good Christians in the colony's vessel, filled with 
recollections of the horrors of early life, and inspired 
by God with a devoted energy in the missionary 
cause. Filled up with glowing description of the 
country, the circumstances of the voyage, the feel- 
ings on landing, the relief of being freed, and the 
rich influence of Christianity upon the human mind 
under such circumstances, it might be made an ex- 
quisite thing. Deb. told me the other day that she 
herself saw a cargo brought into Baltimore, and a 
girl told her that her mother sold her for a cow. 
A king's son at Mount Vernon says his father sold 
him for a yard of red flannel, so that, work it up 
as you will, it is still ' an o'er true tale.' " 

Her interest in Sunday-Schools, also, at this time, 
was very intense, and the energy with which she 
engaged in this and every project presenting the 
prospect of benefit to her fellow-creatures is exhi- 
bited in the following extracts from letters written 



48 A MEMOIR 

by her during a visit to her friends in Essex, Vir- 
ginia, where she first became acquainted with their 
practijal operations. 

"You will feel pleased, as will your dear good 
mother, my respected and most tenderly loved 
friend, feel pleased, to hear that I am rid of the 
burden of anxiety which pressed so heavily on my 
spirits. The prospect before me appears cheering, 
and I may venture at present to say I am as happy 
as human nature and human life may hope to be. 
You will see me, ere long, returning to my father's 
house, and to much more, I trust, than my former 
activity of usefulness. I have been learning many 
good things in this good mansion. Among others, 
I have been cutting out employment for you and 

Mary Ann and Sally , and J , and as 

many other good people as choose to aid us in the 
establishment of a Sunday-School. My admirable 
relative, Mr. Garnet, has organized one here, and 
conducts it himself, in which there are now one 
hundred and sixty scholars, and many have been 
dismissed, having learned, at even an advanced age, 
to read their ' blessed Bible/ Even the young chil- 
dren of the family have their lower classes, in which 
the virtues of the heart and the government of the 
temper are increased by exercise from their earliest 
days. I think our Lancaster school-house might be 
turned in that way to excellent account, and the at- 
tention to it would afford us good exercise and em- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 49 

ployment. I shall bring home the rules and regu- 
lations, lists of books, and all that are necessary. 
Suppose you commence with the organization of 
the plan against I come home, that no time may be 
lost. My head is filled with schemes of benevolence 
and usefulness, at the head of which stands the plan 
which I intrusted to your mamma and yourself. 
My soul is in it, and yesterday I commenced the 
study of botany as preparatory to it. In fine, when 
my head turns to this subject, it seems to me I want 
forty heads, well stored with strong sense, forty 
frames supported by vigorous strength and health, 
and a hundred hands as organs of execution for the 

plans and projects of my one head Continue, 

my dear friend, to look forward to the event of your 
efforts, and do not faint. c Believe, and thou shalt 
be saved/ The offering of a cup of cold water for 
the love of God is not to go unrewarded; and so the 
widow's mite was acceptable, not from its useful- 
ness, but from its evincing the condition of the heart 
— is it not so ? Your afflictions, which are but for 
a time, are to work out for you a far more exceeding 
and eternal weight of glory, than any enjoyment in 
the exercise of any power with which humanity is 
gifted." 

A week later she writes to the same friend. 

"I spent Sunday morning in the Sunday-School^ 
where the members of this inestimable family of 
mine were employed in teaching a hundred poor 
5 



50 A MEMOIR 

children, all neatly and respectably dressed, orderly 
in their deportment, and progressing rapidly with 
spelling-books, testaments, &c. The numerous ad- 
vantages arising from the charitable institution, were 
so forcibly impressed on my mind, that I am ear- 
nestly bent upon our Lancaster house being turned 
to this account, and furthermore on not one day 
being lost. If you agree with me, I know your ex- 
ertions in the cause of humanity will never be want- 
ing, and I wish you could get the books and collect 
the school, counting on me as a regular teacher 
and subscriber. If you can get it up, it must be by 
a subscription in the neighbourhood. Eighty dol- 
lars will be the first cost of the books, and you may 
call upon papa for my share of it. . . . Never were 
my feelings more powerfully affected than by a 
prayer which Mr. Garnet made at the opening of 
the school. I have procured a copy of it, and intend 
it to be read in our school. So moving is a good 
example; seeing one in operation has proved to me 
how much good may be done by those who have 
the soul to act the parts of the madmen in 0. I 
wish I knew that you were going on as rapidly as 
I am, in the recovery of that most precious of all 
human possessions, health. I do not suppose that 
I can ever be perfectly well, but if the next three 
weeks continue to increase my stock, I shall be able 
to pay those debts for which I am now a bankrupt, 
and to set up again in business with the commerce 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 51 

of life, feeling, as I do, an humble reliance on the pro- 
mise of God, that all my debts to Him have been 
cancelled by my Saviour 

"I am very busy in my botanical studies, and the 
wild flowers may look out if they have any reluc- 
tance to being transplanted into my Flora." 

Even from the midst of the gaieties and excite- 
ment of the national metropolis, she writes : 

"Although at the very centre of news, and the 
emporium of gaiety, I neither know, nor, entre 
nous, care one cent about what is going on outside 
of my sitting-room. Intriguing for office, local 
politics, personal jealousies infect the very air, until 
to breathe it is sickening. I long for green grass, 
free breath, free heart, and the Sunday -School" 
And upon the occasion of her return from a visit to 
Alexandria, she thus expresses her views of the 
proper occupation of the talents with which we may 
be endowed. The letter is in reply to one from an 
intimate and highly valued friend, urging the claims 
of society upon one so well qualified to shine in its 
most brilliant circles. 

From my own beloved quiet Dove's Nest. 

My dear Friend, — 

As I find you are not disposed to receive my 
visits, except they come in a certain form, you must 
e'en wait until I am in a mood to pay visits accord- 
ing to the prescribed mode. It is well for you that 
I have been permitted to seat myself in "mine ain 



52 A MEMOIR 

biggin" again, or you would never have heard ano- 
ther word of me. My soul appeared to be gradu- 
ally evaporating, from its close contiguity to a 
vacuum; and my body, incarcerated in a coal-hole, 
gradually wasted its substance, which (as rapidly re- 
placed by coal dust,) would have soon been in a 
state to suffocate you if you touched it — as those 
mummies which the Count De Fontbain cajne in 
contact with, smothered him in the catacombs of 
Egypt. 

What mighty profitable, and pretty lectures may 
be got up, when you dispense with the necessity of 
proving your principles. You are lecturing me in 
a manner which formerly would have been highly 
stimulating, and perhaps set me off like a balloon, 
to carry passengers into the clouds. But the gas 
which inflates these vessels of presumption is vanity : 
and although I was once among the most buoyant 
with it, several tremendous explosions have tho- 
roughly dispersed its fumes, and even destroyed the 
chemical attraction by which it was produced. 
Never shall I move an inch again, from any vain 
idea of being under an obligation to mix with so- 
ciety. A little single drop, separated for ever from 
the element in which it was formed, though crys- 
tallized in dark, cold, gloomy caverns, is a thing to 
be valued. But who would melt it down and cast 
it again into the muddy stream of life ? .1 acknow- 
ledge that there are many persons around me vastly 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 53 

better than I am; but I am speaking of society, not 
people, and I confess that the "unidea-ed chatter of 
females " is past my endurance; — they are very 
capable of better things, but what of that ? Is it not 
yet more annoying, that they will do nothing better? 
And besides all this, I have more painful feelings of 
embarrassment in company than I had at sixteen. 
I am old, too, and when I go into gay scenes the 
illusion is gone, and I fancy the illuminated hall to 
resemble the castle of enchantment, where Armida 
kept all who were capable of virtue bound in the 
lap of pleasure. — I think how a M. Fellenberg has 
devoted a noble spirit to a grand system of educa- 
tion, and given them the model. All admire, all 
talk of it, and no one on the wide globe follows the 
example. Mrs. Fry opens the prison gates — looses 
the bonds of the captive — carries healing into broken 
hearts, or plants virtue where vice was the only 
growth — what are all these chattering women about, 
that they cannot wear a simple garb, and follow her 
to jails and hospitals and poor-houses? No — if I 
cannot do good where there is so much to do, I 
never was and never will be a votary of folly." 

Whilst she had been so much excited by her ob- 
servation of Mr. Garnet's Sunday-School, and im- 
pressed by the prayer with which it was opened, 
Mrs. Garnet, who, about this time, commenced her 
well-known academy for young ladies, requested 
Miss Mercer to send her some written prayers for 

5* 



54 A MEMOIR 

the use of her school. Miss Hunter introduces her 
reply with the remark: "Her conversational elo- 
quence always excited the admiration of her hearers, 
but on sacred subjects, she expressed her thoughts 
with so much fervour, fluency, and* earnestness — so 
much simplicity and beauty, that such a request 
made to her could have excited surprise in no mind 
but her own.'* Yet with characteristic modesty she 
thus writes: 

"It seems, my beloved cousin, always as if my 
heart was so full of grateful affection that there was 
no room for more, and yet I never receive a letter 
from you that does not bring new claims with it. 
I am delighted with the fair prospects of your school. 
God will always bless such enterprises. He some- 
times tries them in the beginning, but only to prove 
the virtue there is in them. The proposal you 
make to me, from any other source I should have 
thought flattery, and it fills me with the deepest 
humility now to find how far I am appreciated be- 
yond my merit. As for the sacred and awful duty 
of prayer, I find myself always, in approaching the 
throne of the Most High, so impressively reminded 
of being but a worm of the dust, incapable of un- 
derstanding my own wants, or interests, that nay 
prayers, except when my heart has been overflow- 
ing with some peculiar suffering or trial, have at best 
been circumscribed to the measure of the poor her- 
mit's — 

'Lord, as in heaven, on earth ihv will be done.' 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER, 55 

"If my excellent cousin wishes assistance in an 
undertaking, for which I think he is himself pecu- 
liarly gifted, I was perfectly enchanted while in Bal- 
timore, with a book called l Smith's Lectures on the 
Duties and Offices of the Christian Ministry/ .... 
Tell cousin James that my favourite prayer is the 
heathen one, c Lord, grant us what is good, though 
I may not know how to ask it, and save us from 
what is evil, though we may ignorantly desire it.' 

"Montgomery has some beautiful thoughts on 
prayer. I have often regretted that children were 
not taught more of the nature of prayer. How 
carefully should we guard every avenue of the heart, 
if we were early impressed with the importance of 
constant communion with God, and that, in fact, the 
daily feeling of our mind is our incessant prayer to 
the Almighty; for 

'Prayer is the soul's sincere desire, 
Uttered or unexpressed.' " 

He to whom all desires are open, and from whom 
no secrets are hid, can be very little affected with a 
form of words when he sees that every disposition 
and desire of the soul is another way. "Cleanse 
the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of thy 
Holy Spirit, that we may perfectly love thee and 
worthily magnify thy holy name." ■ 

There is no more fruitful source of the weakness 
of Christian graces, than the want of a proper appre- 
ciation of the true character of prayer. How many 



56 A MEMOIR 

make themselves miserable by the effort to devote a 
certain time to prayer, or enumerate a certain number 
of objects and persons in a mere form of verbal ad- 
dress, without having the affections and desires of the 
heart properly directed to the subject. No other in- 
centive to the habitual seeking after intercourse with 
the Father of spirits can be needed by the believer 
on the authority of Him who " knew what was in 
man," than the simple direction to His followers to 
" enter into the closet, and shut the door, and pray 
to our Father in secret." The example of Jesus 
adds force to the precept, if that were possible, and 
the sweet experience of every renewed soul will 
cause it, in despite of the unhallowed struggles of 
the flesh to mar or prevent the pleasure of commu- 
nion with its God and Saviour, to seek often to be 
found before the mercy-seat, striving to offer a sa- 
crifice in spirit and in truth. Without this drawing 
of the heart, the mere utterance of words is but the 
" vain repetition" condemned by our Lord. As cer- 
tainly as the heart follows the treasure, so surely will 
one convinced truly of his own need, and the suffi- 
ciency there is in Him who has taught us that he lis- 
tens to the sighing of the contrite heart, and treasures 
up the tears of the penitent — seek relief in prayer. 
It may be the mere uplifting of the affections, the 
unuttered groan with which the spirit labours; but 
such prayers are, like the widow's mite, of more 
value in the sight of Him who knoweth all things, 
than all the costly and laboured offerings brought 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 57 

by those who feel themselves rich in expression, 
whilst the heart is unmoved. 

Prayer can never be a duty to God, as though 
any advantage were to accrue to Him from its dis- 
charge by man. It is the importunate craving of the 
soul sinking under a sense of its need of aid from 
without itself, and it must originate in a sense of 
want to be supplied, or sin to be forgiven. It is a 
duty to ourselves to investigate our condition, and 
our relation to the Judge of the quick and dead, to 
try ourselves by the standard of His holy word and 
Spirit. When this examination exhibits our weak- 
ness, our emptiness, our coldness, deadness, or rebel- 
lion, prayer is the up-springing of the soul to the 
Fountain from whence strength, fulness, warm affec- 
tions, spiritual life, and the turning of the heart, all 
are derived. But it is an amazing privilege to be 
permitted to make known our wants with prayer 
and supplication to One who u heareth prayer," and 
has promised that none shall seek His face in vain. 
The same principle is equally applicable to the 
case of intercession for others. While it may justly 
be esteemed a duty we owe to our neighbour, to 
seek for him the blessings which are promised in 
answer to prayer, unless the desire springs from 
the heart, it must fail to find acceptance with him, 
who of old uttered the complaint against His peo- 
ple, not that they did not seek him at all, but 
that " they drew near to Him with the lips, while 
the heart was far from Him." Where there is 



58 A MEMOIR 

true apprehension of the omnipresence of God and 
his readiness to hear prayer, it will spontaneously 
gush forth in behalf of every object and cause on 
which the heart is fixed, and the fervent prayer thus 
offered becomes effectual to the accomplishment of 
the desire of the soul. 

Miss Mercer's estimate of the value of prayer was 
very high. Years after this period, in writing to a 
nephew who had recently received a commission 
in the navy, and was about to sail, she says: " I can 
only follow you, my dear little sailor-boy, with my 
thoughts and prayers. Yes, dear Willie, the wind 
will never blow now without my heeding it: the bit- 
ter biting frost will never reach me in the winter's 
night, but I shall fancy you on the watch and ex- 
posed to its severity. May the God who rules in 
heaven and on earth, and cares for all His creatures, 
be peculiarly your Father. May He protect and 
bless and save you both body and soul. May He 
suggest by His ever-present Spirit all good to your 
mind, and guide you in the performance of all duties. 
Dear Willie, cleave unto Him, for He is thy life and 
the length of thy days. Pray to Him. reverence 
his holy name, and supplicate Him fervently for 
His Son's sake to give you first His righteousness, 
and then all things that are essential to your tem- 
poral and eternal welfare, and He is pledged to do 
it. Never doubt Him. If you feel a doubt creep- 
ing over your mind from seeing the infidelity of 
men, cast your eyes around you at His visible crea- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 59 

tion. The heavens and the earth, and the great 
ocean with all its wonders speak a language which 
should put infidelity to the blush. He who made 
all things must know all things; therefore, God 
sees your necessities, before you ask. But if He 
chooses to withhold his blessings until you have 
asked for them, take care that the greatest, most 
precious, most indispensable of all His blessings are 
not denied to you because you do not ask them from 
Him in spirit and in truth." 

After much most affectionate and discreet advice, 
appropriate to the circumstances of his condition, 
she encloses the following, and adds : 

"Take it with you, dear Willie, and read it often 
to remind you of the great privilege of prayer. 
How many blessings wait upon it, God only knows, 
but many, we know, more than we are apt to think 
of without some memento, let this be one to you:" 

TO MY SOUL. 

Not on a prayerless bed ; not on a prayerless bed ; 

Compose thy weary limbs to rest ; 

For they alone are blest 

With, balmy sleep. 

Whom angels keep; 

Not though by care opprest, 

Or thought of anxious sorrow, 

Not though in many a toil perplexed 

For coming morrow ) 

Lay not thy head 

On prayerless bed. 



60 A MEMOIR 

For who can say when sleep thine eyes shall close. 

That earthly cares and woes 

To thee may e'er return ! 

Rouse up, my soul! 

Slumber control, 

And let thy lamp burn brightly; 

So shall thine eyes discern 

Things pure and sightly : 

Taught by the Spirit, learn 

Never on prayerless bed 

To lay thine unblesl head. 

Bethink thee. slumbering soul, of all that's promised 

To faith, in holy prayer. 

Lives there, within thy breast. 

A worm that gives unrest I 

Ask peace from Heaven: 

Peace will be given. 

Humble self-love 

Before the Crucified, 

Who for thy sins has died — 

Xor lay thy '"eery head 

On thankless, prayerless bed. 

Hast thou no pining want, or wish, or care. 

That calls for holy prayer ! 

Has thy day been so bright. 

That in its night 

There is no trace of s::r:w? 

And art thou sure to-morrow 

Will be like this a:: a more 

Abundant? Dost thou lay up store 

And still make place for more ! 

Thou fool, this very night 

Thy sou] may wing its night. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 61 

Hast thou no being than thyself more dear. 

Who tracks the ocean deep, 

And when storms sweep 

The wintry, lowering skies, 

For whom thou wakest and weepest ! 

Oh, when thy pangs are deepest, 

Seek thou the covenant ark of prayer, 

For He that slumbereth not is there, 

His ears are open to thy cries — 

Oh, then on prayerless bed 

Lay not thy thoughtless head. 

Hast thou no loved one than thyself more dear, 

Who claims a prayer from thee I 

Some who ne'er bend the knee 

From Infidelity ? 

Think if by prayer they're brought, 

Thy prayer to be forgiven, 

And making peace with heaven, 

Unto the Cross they're led — 

Oh. for their sakes, on prayerless bed 

Lay not thine unblest head. 

Arouse thee, weary soul, yield not to slumber, 
Till in communion blest 
With the elect thou rest, 
Those souls of countless number,— 
And with them raise 
The notes of praise, 
Reaching from earth to heaven,— 
Chosen, redeemed, forgiven: 
So lay thy happy head 
Prayer-crowned, on blessed bed. 
6 



52 * A 3IE3I0IR 

The recognition of the omnipresence of the Deity 
and his minute supervision and direction of all 

events, which is essentially connected with the due 
performance of prayer, was an operative principle 
in Miss Mercer's faith, inwrought with the very 
texture of her soul, and influencing her in every 
action of her life. It was not only the conviction 
that God was about her path and about her bed, 
spying out all her ways, but the feeling of confi- 
dence in his protection was ever a source of comfort 
and support to her in her hours of trial, and added 
increased gratification to every joy. Great as were 
her cares, she cast them upon Him who cared for 
her. and found peace. It was not only as a ground 
for trust and comfort that she held this doctrine. 
but as an incentive to duty, and she regarded each 
event so ordered of God. that she could not avoid a 
duty which was thrown in her way by the so-called 
chances of life. Many circumstances might be 
mentioned illustrative of this. Thus, on one occa- 
sion she writes: "My housemaid, the tall sibylline 
figure vou must have noticed, has been taken with 
distressing fits, which indicate equally a disordered 
mind and body. She has. it seems, been not per- 
fectly honest, and having lately been converted 
after their fashion, the horrors of a disturbed con- 
science, nervous constitution, and great natural 
pride, affect her in such a way, that I am apprehen- 
sive of her losing; her senses. Of course she is an 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER, 63 

object of terror to the children, without their compre- 
hending the nature of her dreadful contortions and 
dismal groanings. I do not know where to bestow 
her, and she has no friends to whom I may send 
her, and yet it may please Him who is to be with 
us always, to make us here the ministers of mercy 
to cast out this evil spirit, and I dare not abandon 
a fellow-creature thus committed to my protection. 
How many offices of humanity one may perform." 
Thus, what others might have done from mere feel- 
ings of compassion, or even with reluctance, as a 
duty which could not be thrust aside, became with 
her an occasion for the exercise of faith in the pro- 
mised blessing of a Saviours presence. The cup of 
water was given in his name and for his sake, and 
the wretched outcast with " no friends " became the 
representative of him who hath said, " Inasmuch as 
ye did it to one of the leastof these,yediditunto me." 
It was from the impulse of a kindred feeling she 
was led to take under her protection a poor vagrant 
boy, whose destitute appearance attracted her atten- 
tion on board a steamboat. Entering into conver- 
sation with him, she found he was without friends, 
and she took him to her own home, clothed him, and 
placed him with a mechanic as an apprentice. Year 
after year she watched over him, with an interest 
not only not abated, but increased b}~ his unsettled 
habits, which prevented him from profiting as he 
should have done by her efforts for his good, With 



64 A MEMOIR 

all his defects, he ever cleaved to her, and constant- 
ly returned to seek her protection, until at last he 
entered upon a whaling voyage, and was lost sight 
of. Whatever the result to him, even though her 
counsel and instruction should not prove to have 
been "seed cast upon the waters/' found in the end 
to produce a harvest, yet she has not missed her re- 
ward in that blessed kingdom where she rests from 
her labour followed by her works. A similar, 
and perhaps still more striking instance occurred, 
in which she extended her protection to one who, 
bursting through the toils in which she had been 
entangled, took shelter under her protection, under 
circumstances which at first caused Miss Mercer to 
question the propriety of extending it. But after 
careful investigation she determined upon her course, 
influenced, as she remarked in a letter to a friend, 
by reverence for that precept of the law of Moses: 
" 'Thou shalt not kill the bird that taketh refuge 
in thy house.' I cannot resign one, who so young, 
and really so interesting, has taken refuge with me 
from the wicked." The word of God was indeed 
the treasure from which she ever drew things new 
and old; and actions which in the common events of 
life are performed without any respect to principle, 
from mere habit or impulse, were with her the legi- 
timate offspring of simple faith. The degree in 
which she entered into the feelings of the humblest 
persons connected with her, was especially interest- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 65 

ing. While she ever retained a self-respect and 
dignity of manner which forbade the slightest ap- 
proach towards forward familiarity, all in her em- 
ploy understood that she regarded their interests as 
much as her own. and was ever ready to extend to 
them counsel in their difficulties, help in their ne- 
cessities, and sympathy in their sorrow. Instances 
of this trait of her character, small in themselves, 
but constantly recurring at every period of her life 
are treasured up in the memory of the many reci- 
pients of her kindness. In a letter received from 
the Rev. G. Adie. rector of the Episcopal church at 
Leesburgh, who officiated regularly at the church at 
Belmont, after its erection, and who was for years 
in habits of almost daily intercourse with her, he 
relates the following incident, which may serve as 
an example of her warm and active sympathy with 
the most destitute around her, and the humility with 
which she performed offices of kindness in their 
behalf. 

u Some five years since, I received a message from 
Miss -Mercer, requesting me to attend at the Epis- 
copal church in this place at a specified hour, to 
perform the burial service over the remains of an 
aged dependant. She had never been in the em- 
ploy of Miss Mercer herself, but a son and daughter 
were in her service. They were Irish, and very 
ignorant. I attended at the church at the hour ap- 
pointed, and found the corpse and mourners there 

6* 



&G A MEMOIR 

in waiting. The body was still in the hearse, and 
Miss Mercer stood in front of the church, with the 
daughter leaning on her arm, and the big tears of 
sympathetic grief rolling down her cheek. Thus 
she walked with her servants to the grave of their 
mother, by looks, actions, and words administering 
consolation; and after the company had dispersed, I 
saw her with tears still in her eyes, speaking to the 
rustic daughter and still more rustic son, as a mother 
or sister, in words of sympathy and tenderness." 
Was not this an appropriate exercise of the grace 
inculcated in the precept of Him who said, ; If I, 
then, your Lord and Master, have washed your feet, 
ye ought also to wash one another's feet?' 

The humility and gentleness of Miss Mercer's 
character, thus exhibited, were so remarkable, that 
it would appear impossible for any other feeling to 
dwell in the same bosom. But whilst love was the 
influential, all-pervading principle by which her ac- 
tions were regulated, and from which they sprung, 
there was no lack of that energy of mind, that 
dauntless courage, and determined adherence to 
right, which is generally considered the attribute of 
a masculine mind, and supposed incompatible with 
the delicate refinement which was the most pro- 
minent feature in her character. At an early pe- 
riod of her Christian life, she writes to her cousin, 
Miss Hunter: " I verily believe that, though often 
thrown back by pride, vanity, and, above all, by my 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 67 

besetting sin, anger, yet I am under the discipline 
of God's own hand, and the atonement is all-suffi- 
cient. Ah! who does not feel the need of a Re- 
deemer? I know I never practised what I was con- 
scious was wrong, and yet how far below my own 
-standard is my life and conduct?' 7 Miss Hunter 
remarks: " This besetting sin, anger, which she men- 
tions, would give the reader a very false idea of her 
temper, if they understood these words an pied de 
lettre. Like most persons of generous disposition 
and ardent feelings, her temper was naturally warm 
and quick, but perfectly devoid of all peevishness 
and resentment, and her indignation was aroused 
rather at what offended her high and pure ideas of 
religion and morality, than from any of those per- 
sonal causes which usually excite anger. Oppres- 
sion, insincerity, any thing tending to subvert the 
true and the good, always aroused her indignation 
and resistance, and in a righteous cause she was ca- 
pable of evincing that high degree of moral courage, 
that unflinchingfortitude which are generally thought 
to be masculine rather than feminine attributes." 

There was one friend to whom Miss Mercer was 
strongly attached, and to whom she wrote with 
much freedom; who, though possessed of an intel- 
lect of a high order, and affections of the warmest 
kind, was yet liable to a nervous affection, which 
caused great affliction both to her friends and her- 
self, amounting at times to entire alienation of a 



68 A MEMOIR 

mind naturally vigorous. Near neighbours when at 
home, circumstances often separated them. The 
following extracts from the letters of Miss Mercer 
show the warmth of her sy mpathies and her readiness 
to impart consolation or instruction, as the case of 
her friend might require. She thus addressed her 
on the occasion of the sudden death of a mutual 
friend: — 

" I have-been for some time hoping that I should 
have the gratification of hearing from you, but had 
I had any thing pleasing to communicate, I should 
have been tempted to write without. Now that the 
severe and sudden affliction which it has pleased an 
all-wise Father to send upon you has opened every 
source of sympathy,I cannot deny myself thesatisfac- 
tion of commencing. I know but too well that there 
are trials in which God says to every days-man who 
would come between Him and the creature suffer- 
ing under his rod, < Stand by and let me speak;' and 
blessed indeed is the soul which, while melted in 
this strong fire, receives the perfect and indelible 
impression for which it is purposely softened. 

"In reflecting on the painful occurrence from which 
I know your dear mother and yourself will suffer 
so deeply, I have hoped you would draw much con- 
solation from the certainty that to her it was evi- 
dently a most merciful dispensation. If I was asked 
to choose a desirable fate, I would say,- give me 
healthy competence, and ease, with a cultivated tin- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 69 

derstanding, an equal temper, and sanctify them all 
by enlightened, pious, active devotion, and end this 
blessed life by a sudden death." 

This "cultivation of the understanding" was 
highly prized by Miss Mercer; and while few 
equalled her in warmth of affection or intensity of 
feeling, she ever strove to attain to higher degrees 
of intellectual elevation, so that with her mental 
development, spiritual growth advanced simultane- 
ously. Indeed, the improvement of her mind was 
regarded as much a privilege as a duty, and was un- 
dertaken with the desire to promote the glory of 
Him from whom its powers are derived. Miss 
Hunter, in speaking of this, says: 

"It is highly interesting, not only in a Christian, 
but in a psychological point of view, to trace the 
progress of her spiritual and intellectual develop- 
ment as connected together and mutually acting on 
each other. The progress of mind in her case was 
not confined to an acquisition of knowledge and ex- 
perience, an increase of the treasures of thought as 
relating only to the intellect, but every new ray of 
mental light was accompanied with a brighter illu- 
mination of moral and religious truth. An intimate 
acquaintance with her would have been a sufficient 
refutation of the vulgar error, that the mind is nar- 
rowed in proportion as it is brought under the influ- 
ence of strict religious principle and feeling. Con- 
sistency, elevation and determination of purpose, a 



TO A MEMOIR 

steadier and more enlightened view of the great ends 
of human existence, combined with that glorious 
liberty of mind which arises from the constant habit 
of referring to the word of God as a standard of 
opinion and action, without regard to the opinion 
of man. are the natural accompaniments of real re- 
ligious progress: and to all who knew Miss Mercer 
intimately, these blessed and genuine fruits of Chris- 
tianity were plainly evident in her life and charac- 
ter. She knew and admitted that claim in the first 
law of holiness, which is so often overlooked, even 
by pious persons: she loved the Lord her God with 
all her mincL as well as with all her soul, with all 
her strength, and with all her heart.** 

Yet energetic as was her mind, and diligent as 
were her efforts to attain to the utmost degree of 
development of intellectual power within her reach. 
she could also appreciate and cultivate that retire- 
ment of feeling in which the spirit turns in upon 
itself, and seeks in quietness to know its own con- 
dition, without much active exercise of thought. 
Thus, in writing to the friend whose afflictions have 
been alluded to, she says: " I have been staying at 
home for a week in perfect solitude. If, as I am 
well persuaded from observation, as well as from 
sacred instruction, the ties of social life were, and 
are 5 and must be essential to man's nature, I am no 
less certain that it is necessary that we should com- 
mune with our hearts in our own chambers, and be 






OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 71 

still. I would not give the effect, even for present 
comfort, which this season of retirement has had on 
my heart and mind for all that I could gather in 
years of bustling activity in the world. But, alas! 
this soothing balm, poured over the weary and ha- 
rassed spirit, cannot be always enjoyed. Duty for- 
bids it; and even the restless energies of our nature 
are no sooner recruited by repose, than they must 
again ' be up and doing/ 9i Thus, in all circum- 
stances she found lessons of wisdom. After refer- 
ring to other matters, she exhibits the strength of 
her affection: — "Many and strong as my ties are, 
still there are few of my connexions — may I not say 
none? — from whom through life I have derived so 
much and so unalloyed pleasure as from you. I re- 
member, with swelling heart and a full eye, that 
when I came home young, impetuous, and incau- 
tious, open to censure on every side, you received 
me with a warmth of affection which has never va- 
ried in fifteen years, through health and through 
sickness, through weal and through wo. I wish I 
could send you the tear that is falling over this 
thought, for never was a more genuine tribute paid 
to generous affection, — the tear I have brushed away, 
but the feeling is as permanent as the expression is 
transient." And this was no empty declamation, 
as was proved by a continuance of the warmest 
friendship and truest sympathy through twenty ad- 
ditional years, in each of which that friend drank 



72 A MEMOIR 

more and more deeply of the chalice of affliction. 
After one of these seasons of distress. Miss Mercer 
thus greeted a letter from her:— 

"You can hardly imagine, my dear friend, how- 
much pleased I was to see once more your hand- 
writing ;. and although I am much distressed to find 
you sad. yet it is a great privilege to have a letter 
from you. I think of you every hour at this season, 
because I know so well what enjoyment you have 
in the return of the floral months. — enjoyments, 
however, which belong to the spring-time of our 
lives, when the senses are peculiarly alive to plea- 
sure, and which naturally decay with our years, 
For my own part. I find every year the bloom of 
my flowers seems to produce less effect upon my 
sight, and they become graver and more solemn, 
though affectionate mementoes of the rapid passage 
of this troubled span. 

"I went yesterday into the graveyard, and the 
violets which I had planted with my own hands, 
close to the head of my mother's grave, had spread 
all around, and the ground was enamelled with them. 
Thus it is that God has ordained that forms of be- 
ing, which belong solely to the material creation, 
shall be much more permanent and unperishable, 
than that burden of dust, which ties down the spi- 
ritual being to an unnatural state, if we may so ex- 
press ourselves. How confused are all our percep- 
tions, while afflicted by this incongruous union of a 



OJ MISS MARGARET MERCER. /3 

material and spiritual being. And yet this is the 
only means which we can conceive of making us 
acquainted with the high perfections of that state, 
in which we are to have celestial bodies eternal in 
the skies, and leading us to long to lay down this 
body of sin and death, and rise incorruptible and 
immortal. Oh, my dear friend, how much does it 
console me, when I grieve for the afflictions of your 
present state, and think how the heaven-born spirit 
is darkened by the veil of flesh, to look forward to 
meeting you at the mercy seat of Him who over- 
came the flesh by His precious death, and opens his 
tender arms to all that mourn. Mental diseases and 
afflictions are the severest trials of our probationary 
state, and one is sometimes amazed at the myste- 
riousness of God's providence when they behold 
His most faithful servants passing away from the 
earth under such clouds. But even here we must 
remember the blessed Jesus on the cross, and with 
David say, 'This is my infirmity f and with Job, 
'Though He slay me, yet will I trust in him.' . . . 
. . . The Man who gave up the ghost, saying: < My 
God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?' is now 
at the right hand of the throne, most high in the 
glory of God the Father. Sacred, mysterious les- 
son of humility and patience! Job did not receive 
double in earthly treasures as the reward of his faith. 
Though he had died scraping his sores with a pot- 
sherd, he w r ould have been the same Job in the sight 
7 



74 A MEMOIR 

of God, and like Lazarus have been carried into 
Abraham's bosom by exulting angels. Let me en- 
treat you then still, my precious friend, to try to 
keep this in view, even when the light of His coun- 
tenance is turned from you, and the Prince of this 
world comes in the power of darkness and despair. 
Remember that to whom you deliberately give 
yourself, to Him you belong, and still the troubled 
waters of your soul w T ith the recollection of his love 
and his sufferings, who was worthy to be accepted 
as a full oblation and propitiation for the sins of the 
whole world. Do not look upon the thorn in the 
flesh, which we all bear in the body of sin and cor- 
ruption, as the sin of the spirit. Cast all your cares 
and fears upon Him, and know for a certainty, 
whether you can at all times see it or not, that He 
is almighty to save, and that none ever desired to be 
saved by Him, and were rejected. If any have said 
they desired it, and have not mourned over a broken 
and contrite heart, they lied unto Him with their lips, 
and deceived Him with their tongues. They were 
mere lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, and 
wished not to see his holiness, his righteousness, but 
had some vague earthly notions of inheriting a sen- 
sual heaven, like their earthly imaginations. This 
is not you. What are your prayers, but for holiness 
and conformity to God ? This is what He desires, 
and you shall yet enjoy your desires; therefore, my 
dear, dear friend, try to keep it in mind. The cloud 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 75 

is over your eyes, but the Sun of God is shining 
bright upon you — you shall yet see it, and though 
you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, 
fear no evil, for God is there, and God is love" 

There was ever a sweetness and gentleness in the 
tones of her consolation, and a rich power in the 
themes she chose, upon which to dwell, which gave 
additional strength to the effort she put forth to lead 
the souls of those who mourned or suffered to that 
state of resignation in which only peace can be 
found. 

It is easy for such as have never known sorrow 
to sit down, whilst themselves enjoying all the bless- 
ings of Providence, and preach to others the pro- 
priety of submission to the Divine will. It is another 
thing to feel this submission in our own case; and, 
not inexperienced, to draw them to a source of con- 
solation of which we have ourselves tasted, and of 
which we have proved the power to heal, and sanc- 
tify. It was from deep personal experience Miss 
Mercer wrote. She had herself, at this time, drunk 
deeply of the cup of sorrow, and the waves of afflic- 
tion had rolled, in all their heaviness, over her soul. 
The one she had found, though grievous at the first, 
yielding peaceful fruits of righteousness, and she 
had experienced the power of Jesus to speak to the 
other, and cause the tempest to subside into a great 
calm. It was, therefore, with experimental power 
that she strove to lead her friend to the same holy 



76 A MEMOIR 

submission, the sweet influence of which she had so 
eminently proven. At another time she thus ad- 
dressed the same friend: 

"My dear Friend, — 

"This morning I am thirty-three years old! 
How short seems the time since I wept bitterly to 
think I was sixteen, and so deficient as I felt myself. 
More than an equal period has elapsed, and I would 
weep again even more bitterly, had I not meanwhile 
discovered that there is a sufficiency for man's in- 
sufficiency, and that all that we can acquire by our 
best services, is a consciousness that we are unpro- 
fitable servants, and a devoted confidence in Christ, 
the power of God and the wisdom of God, who is 
able to save all who will be saved. Oh, merciful 
Saviour of a sinful world, let me never have any 
other hope or desire but to be forgiven for my Re- 
deemer's sake, to be cleansed by His atoning blood, 
to glory in His cross, and to say in spirit and in 
truth, I am altogether worthless and of unclean lips: 
there is no truth in me. But thou art true and faith- 
ful to forgive all my sins and to heal all my infir- 
mities. You, my ever dear friend, have gone 
through a fiery furnace of affliction, but 1 fear you 
have never yet, even in your sound moments, real- 
ized the nature of that sustaining faith which renders 
it impossible for the believer to sink where the rea- 
son is unimpaired. Can you not, my dear, dear, 



- OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 77 

Miss , acquire that meek and contrite sense of 

the utter inability of man to do any thing; of the 
utter insignificance of our own being and nature, so 
as to confess that you are not worthy so much as to 
pick up the crumbs from your Father's table ? No- 
thing, depend upon it, is acceptable in His eyes but 
the spirit of Lazarus, whose sores the dogs came and 
licked. Had that poor sufferer resented even this act 
of compassion, and rebelled against even this degree 
of degradation, he would have been no happier in 
his fate than the rich man who wore purple and fine 
i^nen. Do not misapprehend my meaning, and sup- 
pose for an instant that I am not sensible of the pe- 
culiar sufferings to which you are exposed from 
bodily disease and nervous irritability; but the will 
of a rational creature, I must ever think, is indepen- 
dent of outward circumstances, and the will can and 
ought to submit itself implicitly to the will of God. 
' Let God be true, and every man a liar/ We have 
no right, in self-defence, to impute to him conduct 
which He denies ; and let us take care that we be not 
found fighting against God, when we say He tries 
us above that which we are able to bear. < Are not 
my ways equal, are not your ways unequal?' 

"Now, my precious friend, I am as confident as 
I am of my existence, that the moment you will sub- 
mit the pride of the flesh, as a willing sacrifice at the 
foot of the Cross, and will say, I will 'joy in tribu- 
lations? I will ' die daily? that being 6 crucified 

7* 



75 A MEMOIR 

with Christ. I may also rise with him y that moment, 
the fiends of remorse and despair which now haunt 
you, will be ( cast out/ never to possess your soul 
again. My friend, love me, believe me when I say 
to you, 'Trust in the goodness of God.' ■ Resist 
the devil,' by the grace of God which is freely given 
to all who ask it, and he will -flee from you.' " 

Some further extracts from letters to her friends 
will illustrate the state of her religious feelings. 

i; But alas, alas! what is the world with all its 
fleeting show? ' There is nothing true but heaven.' 
; Oh, man, place not thy happiness in this life/ 
was the affecting exclamation of the virtuous, the 
wise, the powerful monarch, who, beloved by his 
subjects, and respected by himself, numbered four- 
teen happy days of life. Religion, such as Abdul- 
rahman did not possess the advantage of, is certainly 
the only source of perfect happiness. But when 
shall religion obtain the perfect sway which places 
us above the world, like the eminences which are 
scattered over the face of the globe. We often, by 
strong impulses and efforts, attain a point from which 
all earthly concerns seem to be vanishing from our 
view. But prone to action, we presently descend 
again from our height, to mix in the grovelling herd. 
Happy they who can fix their eyrie in such Icr.y 
scenes, and onlv descending: to the earth for the 
support of their mortal existence, find all their plea- 
sure in soaring sublime where God alone abides. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 79 

For myself, I am so weary of the imperfections of 
my nature, the constant failures where I had thought 
myself most safe, that I am ready to lay my head in 
the dust and cover it with the ashes of contrition." 
"The hermitess of Cedar Park sends this to her 
beloved friend, greeting. Yes, my dear cousin, at 
last I have accomplished the wish of my heart, and 
alone with my reconciled God, I am enjoying a rest 
for my weary spirit. Long, too long have the 
w r hirlvvinds of human passions made me their sport; 
and now that I am freed from the bonds which social 
connexions weave around our hearts, I feel as if life 
had been one long troubled dream or a horrid night- 
mare, and I had just awoke and satisfied myself that 
my real existence held out the promise of a pure 
serene sky and a quiet rest. I have been now five 
days without beholding the face of a human creature 
except the servants, until the doctor came in for a 
moment this evening. I am in really good health, 
such as I never hoped to enjoy, as good as any body's. 
I live temperately, read good books, and have even 
gone back to my youthful tastes, read Cymbeline 
with delight, and have experienced that sensation 
which the French call being 'emu? from reading 
the Allegro once more, in a degree that I never felt 
it from poetry before. Yet, is this sweet serenity 
not the consequence of indulging in these pleasures 
of imagination, but the taste for the pleasures is 
produced by the serenity of the mind; and the se- 



80 A MEMOIR 

renity is the Spirit of God moving on the deep, and 
saying to the waves, * Peace, be still/ What time 
this happy calm may last, I fear to think. I am so 
in love with it that I could almost be tempted to 
wish, like Cowper, that 

' Rumour of the world might never reach me more;' 
for except in the connexion with my beloved Essex 
friends, I may truly say that human affections have 
ever been the fruitful source of unhappiness, and 
that in proportion as they have been strong, they 
have always been afflicting to me. Hopes seem 
contrived like the steps of a ladder, placed against 
the heavens, which as we pass ardently on, looking 
from one to another, are drawn silently out beneath 
our feet, until when we stop, weary and discouraged, 
and would return whence we came, we find a chasm 
no more to be retraced. Every stay has vanished 
that we firmly relied on, and our only chance of 
safety seems to be in reaching the ultimate goal 
where we may find rest for our fainting souls. Yet 
how long is it, even after reaching this point, before 
we approach near enough to be completely weaned 
in our affections, and intent only upon the bright 
prospect before us. Prone to the earth, the flesh 
weighs down our imperfect spirits, and if it were 
not for the gracious mercy of Providence in thus as 
it were cheating us into our salvation, how few 
would reach the mansions of the accepted in God. 
"I do not mean when I speak of the serenity I 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 81 

am enjoying, to deceive you into the idea that no 
cares, no painful anxious feelings and reflections in- 
trude even here. 'Man is born to trouble, as the 
sparks fly upward/ and as we are heirs of peace and 
joy through the death of Christ, so while in the flesh 
will we find that we are heirs also to the imperfec- 
tions and the miseries of humanity. Often, too 
often indeed, from the ardour of our natural impulses, 
the strength of our imaginations and the weakness 
of our judgments, we involve ourselves in pains 
and perplexities which we can scarcely refer to our 
fate. But even then, when the intentions are pure, 
honest, and generous, we have a Father, who seeth 
our weakness, and provides for our safety. I never 
but once in my life suffered the agitation of mind 
which I have gone through since last summer; but 
when it pleases God to carry us through trials in 
which human aid cannot avail us, He seems to place 
us out of the reach of every earthly dependence, 
and 

" ' When thus humbled, 
When to our feeble natural powers resigned, 
'Tis then we own this universal truth, 
That God is all in all, and man is nothing.' 

" The storm has passed in its power, and my house 
still stands, 'for it was built upon a rock/ But I 
hear ever and anon the distant rushing of the tem- 
pest's wing, and I tremble with the dread of its re- 
turn ; for, indeed, I am too humble with the sense 



82 A MEMOIR 

of my own weakness to feel any security, until <I 
stand in His own likeness in the presence of God.' 
How blessed even for this life is the injunction to 
< press forward to the mark for the prize of our 
high calling, not looking to the things which are 
behind/" 

Such was the habitual state of her heart, and thus, 
by the strength of her reasoning, the beauty and 
force of her illustrations, and the appropriate ele- 
gance of unpremeditated expression, she exhibited 
a character worthy of all admiration. 

In nothing, except by the actual prevalence of 
moral degradation, is the ruin brought upon the 
creation by " man's first disobedience," so strikingly 
exhibited as it is by the impossibility of arriving at 
certain, positive, unquestioned results, by any pro- 
cess of reasoning. Turn we to what branch of 
human knowledge we may, we find the loftiest in- 
tellects still debating and doubting; or if individuals 
have arrived at a certainty satisfactory to themselves, 
where do we find unity of conviction on the part of 
the many fellow-investigators of the same subject ? 
Even when for a time a master mind appears, and 
carries with it the throng, who are followers, only 
because content not to think for themselves, the 
moment another teacher arises, the crowd diverges 
into the new track, or divides. When the same 
result is arrived at, how often does the imperfection 
of language, man's highest attainment, produce mis- 






OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. S3 

conception, and give rise to controversy. Every 
branch of human knowledge — the science of go- 
vernment, law, medicine, is liable to this remark. 
Even those which are the subjects of direct observa- 
tion, as astronomy, natural philosophy, chemistry, 
are not exempt. If such be the case in matters 
within the scope of our understanding, how pre- 
sumptuous is it to suppose that our finite faculties 
are able to comprehend all the mysteries of the 
dealings of the Creator with the works of his hand. 
The language of Dryden is aptly descriptive of the 
relation which reason bears to revelation. 

" Dim as the borrowed light of moon and star 
To weary, way-worn, wandering traveller, 
Is reason to the soul. And as on high 
These rolling fires discover but the sky, 
Not light us here, so reason's ray 
Serves not to assure us on our doubtful way, 
But guide us upward to a better day.'* 

It is, however, upon this reason that the better 
day must shine, and through its instrumentality are 
effected the great purposes of the Spirit of God. 
While, therefore, in the wisdom of God, the grand 
fundamental principles of revealed truth are so plain, 
that, to use its own illustration, the wayfaring man, 
though a fool, cannot err in the way of salvation, it 
is but reasonable to expect just that divergency of 
thought, and discrepancy of opinion on points of 
inferior moment, which observation of man has 
taught us to exist in every age of the church. How 



84 A MEMOIR 

few are there, even among that small number univer- 
sally recognised as possessed of the loftiest intelli- 
gence and purest faith, who have not held opinions 
on some points from which others equally great and 
equally good, have differed. Man is thus taught a les- 
son of humility, as regards his own powers, and of 
charity towards the opinions of other, which he is 
slow to receive and act upon, This infirmity of rea- 
son was manifested in Miss Mercer's case, and she 
was led by it to the adoption of some views on theo- 
logical subjects, essentially different from those held 
by any known sect of Christians, and with her wonted 
energy of character she devoted herself with the 
utmost assiduity to the investigation of the Scrip- 
tures, which she recognised as the only standard by 
which truth in religion could be tested, in order to 
sustain her principles. Not satisfied with this, she 
undertook the study of Hebrew, in order to draw. 
as she thought, more purely from the fountain head: 
and devoted herself with untiring zeal to the pre- 
paration of an essay on her peculiar opinions, which 
extended to some two hundred pages, and was care- 
fully prepared for the press, having been a fourth 
time copied with her own hand. 

Her every power of heart and intellect was com- 
pletely absorbed in this subject: scarce a letter was 
written at the time, without some allusion to it. 
"If it were possible,'* she says at one time, u \ 
should rejoice to think that I was never to go be- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 83 

yond sight of that little enclosure." where will 
shortly repose silent, low in beds of dust, those who 
loved me first, last, midst, and I devoutly trust, 
without end. I am deeply engrossed at present in 
an inquiry, by which I suppose I must bring on 
myself much odium, and consent that some of 'my 
admirers should be removed far from me/ How- 
ever, let that be: I would willingly compound to 
bear the world's reproach to advance a good end, 
and this I have so much at heart that I feel as 
though faith could remove mountains. If I can 
succeed, the labour will yet be one of months; but 
it makes me happy. I think of nothing else; I am 
pondering it in my bed. and writing or reading 
every spare moment through the day. Sometimes 
I find myself lost in the contemplation of the sub- 
lime whole: sometimes bewildered in the minute 
branching of the subject. However, if I devote my 
life to it, it will never tire me/" At another time 
she says: ••A laborious business it is, but I am so 
convinced that it is very important to the interests 
of religion, that I am as bad as old Mause Hiedelrig, 
who would -hold up her testimony to the last. 5 
However, don't you take advantage of the unfortu- 
nate coincidence of names, and dub me "'old Mause,' 
for I shall have enough to contend with, and expect 

* A family burial-place in the grounds at Cedar Park. The letter 
was written in the interval between the lead] of her father, and the re- 
moval of his remains from PhL 
S 



A MEM 

ling less than Lhat tl : ps will 

apply to the Pope for o boll ci excommunication 
against roe," And again she says: •• Since yet: left, 

Mr. has lightened my heart of a cons. 

by his liberal trei i::ic :ts. as i; 

is a great satisfaction to know that the beat Chris- 

g find nothing offensive, w some to 

hear all. Is e governed by his moderate and 

prudent counsel, were I not urged on by motives 
paramount to all human considerations. 'I:' it be 

of God. it will eome to naught; 3 if i: be, I p 

be foun ting his frill, :ertainly 

it would be. to y hoii- 

fc y" 

And yet it was by these -ittrber: 
counsels." and this "liberal treatment of her 
nions." that she was influenced. A less experienced 

and sincere Christian than Mr. . by nasty con- 
demnation and opposition would bare kindled the 
iral bete m :: her character int. o resist- 
less note. :ead :■: : life of usefulness, in 
training souls for glory, and honour, and immor- 
tality, o le energy ci he: :haracter wc 
h tve been wr.stea" in o bathe attempt to establish an 
opin which would have necessarily 

lyed in hostility to iter toe advocates of ^very 
known Christian sect. Bishtp Johns writes of iter 
religions Dpinions as follows: 

"With reo:::l to Miss Mercer's sentiments on 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 87 

the subject of revealed truth, I have reason to know 
that some twenty years since, she was inclined to 
adopt and maintain views on certain speculative 
points which neither you nor I could approve, and 
which it was to be feared might have had an un- 
happy influence on her religious character and course. 
I always ascribed this strange obliquity to the power- 
ful excitement of her sympathies, which, for a time 
at least, seemed to bring her strong intellect into 
subjection, and made it work in captivity to her 
natural feelings. She was then possessed with the 
vast importance of what she regarded as new light, 
and flattered herself that it would remove some of 
the serious difficulties in the way of the progress of 
religion. At the period to which I refer, she was 
pleased to submit to my inspection a long and la- 
boured essay on the points alluded to, from publish- 
ing which I endeavoured to dissuade her. Her good 
sense and self-control determined her to restrain her 
own inclination in deference to the unanimous coun- 
sel of friends in whose judgment she had confidence. 
The essay was suppressed, and from that time I 
never heard her allude to the views it contained; 
nor should I, but for the correspondence which had 
passed between us, have supposed for a moment that 
such views had ever been regarded by her with even 
transient favour. In all my subsequent intercourse 
I found her the earnest, able advocate of that sys- 
tem of doctrine which we hold to be evangelical, 



8S A MEMOIR 

and which distinguishes the writings of Romaine, 
Newton, Scott, and Wilberforce, — the doctrines of 
grace as set forth in our thirty-nine articles. These 
were her sustenance and strength, effectually in- 
wrought in her experience, and beautifully illustra- 
ted in her consistently holy conversation and useful 
life; and as they animated her own soul in the cause 
of Christian duty, so on them she relied in her un- 
wearied efforts to educate others for the service of 
God on earth, and for his presence and glory in 
heaven. She has finished that course with signal 
honour and triumph, and received her crown; and 
hereafter, I doubt not, will be recognised in the 
order of those who, having turned many to right- 
eousness, shall'shine as the stars for ever and ever." 
That the defective opinions now referred to, did 
not at all involve the great fundamental truths of 
revelation, neither diminishing her estimate of the 
entire ruin of man by the fall, nor her appreciation 
of the necessity of divine intervention for the re- 
storation of our race from the consequences of sin, 
must be evident to all who read the exposition of 
her views on these subjects, in her correspondence 
with her friends. That she worshipped constantly, 
and from choice, according to the mode prescribed 
by the Protestant Episcopal Church, proves her ap- 
probation of the doctrines and discipline of that 
church: nor did she hesitate to avow her increasing 
attachment to its services. With several of its 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 89 

bishops and many of its members she maintained 
an uninterrupted intercourse; and one of the latest 
efforts of her life was made to secure the services of 
Bishop Meade, for whose character she had the 
highest reverence, in the confirmation of her pupils, 
led through her instrumentality to consecrate them- 
selves to the service of the Lord Jesus. To the 
liturgy and other offices for public worship, she was 
deeply attached, and often expressed the increasing 
delight with which she united in them. And the 
edifice erected by her untiring zeal, and by her own 
desire consecrated to the worship of God according 
to the usages of the Episcopal Church, will stand as 
a permanent witness to her soundness in the funda- 
mental principles of our faith. 

Some of the expressions of the letters recently 
introduced afford sufficient evidence that we have 
now reached a period in the history of Miss Mercer 
at which the circumstances by which she was sur- 
rounded, and under the influence of which the graces 
of her character had been developed, were to un- 
dergo an entire change. The reality of her faith 
was to be tested, and its strength invigorated by 
the storms of adversity — and this, not for a short 
period only, but the continued priuiing of the hea- 
venly husbandman was to render more perfect, and 
increase the fruit, by which she gave evidence of 
abiding in the vine. 

The death of her father, which took place at 
8* 



90 A MEMOIR 

Philadelphia, where she had accompanied him with 
the design of seeking the advice of Dr. Physick, 
proved a crisis in her life; and from this time we 
are to trace her course no longer amid the pleasant 
scenes of affectionate intercourse with attached 
friends and relatives, but amid the buffetings of the 
storm which beat unceasingly around her later path- 
way through life. But, says Miss Hunter, " In all 
the most afflictive bereavements which she suffered, 
not a murmur was ever heard from her lips, nor 
any of those complaints of peculiar trial, w 7 hich are 
often indirect accusations against the love or justice 
of our Creator. She considered it a duty, not only 
to say but to feel, and to show, also, that she felt, 
that all events are disposed by Him who ordereth 
all things well, and it was one of the most lovely 
and endearing traits of her character, that her own 
sorrows did not make her forgetful of the feelings 
of her friends, nor prevent her sympathy with, their 
joys and sorrows." She writes at this time to -Mrs. 
Garnet: 

"I have been washing every day, my beloved 
cousin, to write to you, but you know the state of 
languor consequent upon great excitement. At the 
moment I felt most forlorn, I requested that some 
one would write to you, and my aunt kindly under- 
took the office. Since that, I have been harassed 
by travelling, anxiety, and other causes; yet I ought 
to have written to you w T hen I could have afforded 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 91 

you the satisfaction of hearing that my own health, 
so far from suffering, has recruited amidst all my 
trials. I make it a principle of duty never unne- 
cessarily to rake up the ashes of a buried sorrow, 
and to bury every sorrow that may interrupt the 
happiness of others. The loss is mine peculiarly — 
all around me have hopes and occupations from 
which they derive their enjoyment and their sup- 
port. I am (for myself) constantly reminded of the 
fable of the leaf: 

1 De la tige detachee 
Fauvre feuille dessechee, 
Ou va tu 1 Je n'en sais rien — 
L'orage a frappe le chene, 
Qui seul etait mon soutien, 
Depuis ce temps je me promene, 
Ou le vent me mene.' 

"But the wind that conducts me is the power of 
the God of heaven and earth, and although tossed 
painfully upon the storms, I know there is a pros- 
perous breeze in store to carry me safe into the 
harbour of eternal rest. 

' Je vais ou va toute chose — 
Ou va la feuille de rose, 
Et la feuille de laurier.' 

"And nothing is vain — no care, no grief, no long- 
protracted misery, or rapid reverse of fortune are 
lost in the providence of Him who maketh the evil 
work for good." 



92 A MEMOIR 

There could be neither reason nor propriety in 
the invasion of the sacred precincts of private life to 
exhibit before a larger circle of observers the events 
which produced this change in her circumstances. 
It is sufficient to allude to them merely as links in 
that chain by which God in his own way, often high 
above our comprehension, is accomplishing his pur- 
pose of mercy to his creatures. As not only clouds 
and darkness, but storms and tempests, even in the 
physical world, produce increased blessing, more 
than sufficient to balance the evils which more im- 
mediately follow their occurrence, so in the accom- 
plishment of the work of grace, whether in the 
individual soul, or, through its instrumentality, in 
the world around, everlasting good is continually 
produced as the direct result of temporal evil. "He 
maketh even the wrath of man to praise him," 
from seeming evil still educing good. But though 
we may not lift the veil to gaze upon the proper 
lineaments of the portrait, it may be permitted me 
to declare, that had her faith been of that spurious 
kind which passes current with the world, but pro- 
duces little fruit to God's glory — had not her dis- 
interested self-renunciation been of a character but 
rarely seen, and her integrity perfect in its actings 
and lofty in its conceptions, she had it in her power 
to have secured to herself the means by which she 
would have been placed far above the necessity of 
any personal exertion or self-denial, without the 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER, 93 

slightest sacrifice of integrity in the esteem of the 
world. She not only had that faith which looks 
not at the things which are seen, but at those which 
are unseen and eternal, but the consciousness also of 
the possession of faculties which had been conferred 
upon her for purposes of blessing to her fellow- 
creatures, and glory to the Giver; and renouncing 
her well-established rights, and abandoning all con- 
sultation with personal ease and comfort, she entered 
at once upon a path beset with circumstances of 
vexation and trial, and leading over heights of dif- 
ficulty, from the encountering of which, nature 
would certainly have shrunk. It was known to but 
few of those who are familiar with the subsequent 
course of Miss Mercer, that no necessity thrust her 
down from a position of ease and affluence and 
urged her to undertake her arduous duties; but that 
it was the result of a lofty impulse of upright, 
honourable principle, such as is rarely witnessed in 
the world. 

There is no record of the struggles of feeling 
which must have been experienced, beyond occa- 
sional expressions of a general character in letters 
to her friends; but a feeble state of bodily health 
afforded sufficient evidence of what was passing 
within, and might easily have furnished an apology 
to herself and others for seeking her own ease and 
comfort. 

Her first effort was made by leaving the home of 



94 A MEMOIR 

her affections, the place of her nativity, and the 
scenes whose loveliness had given them a hold on 
her heart, which no length of separation ever had 
power to detach or even loosen, and assume the duties 
of a teacher of drawing and painting in the school 
of her relative and highly valued friend, Mrs. Gar- 
net, of Virginia. Having chosen her path, there 
was no indulgence in useless murmuring or repining, 
no disposition to seek her own comfort or stipulate 
for all the privileges in her power to attain. An 
only daughter, an object of idolatrous affection to a 
fond father and brother, she abandoned not only the 
luxuries but the comforts of her station, with the 
simple request, that if it were convenient in making 
arrangements for her reception, her chamber might 
be shared, if possible, by the younger children, her 
habit of devoting a considerable portion of the night 
to study, rendering them less objectionable compa- 
nions than those who were older. Yet, even in 
this, she is ready to submit her own comfort to the 
convenience of her friends. She thus describes her 
occupations, and the feelings incident to her new 
vocation, in a letter written soon after entering on 
her duties: 

"You cannot imagine, my beloved friend, how 
grateful I felt on receiving your letter, to hear from 
you, to know you were better, to see your hand- 
writing once more. It cheered me in my toils. I 
have not been separated from you in feeling for one 



OJ MISS MARGARET MERCER. 95 

single hour, and I have been desiring a day or two 
of repose that I might devote to you and your 
dearest mother. But, indeed, you have very little 
idea of the life I lead. Saturday is as laboriously 
spent in working for the Liberian Society, as any 
other day in the week, and on Sunday we have a 
Sunday-School, in which I have my part, and so 
make out to employ every day fully. Drawing 
keeps me on my feet for six hours every other day, 
and at first it was truly bewildering to teach twenty- 
three children who did not know how to make a 
straight line. You are anxious to know all about 
me, and you see I am free in my communication: 
there are many encouraging circumstances in the 
mode of life I have adopted, for those very things 
that are most painful prove how much there is to 
do; and where there is much to do, steady labori- 
ous efforts to do good will doubtless be blessed, al- 
though we may in mercy be denied the luxury of 
seeing our work under the sun prosper. Mrs. G. 
is sometimes very much dispirited, at times without 
cause, for every little painful occurrence of miscon- 
duct in the children affords opportunity of more 
strenuously enforcing good principles. I never 
knew how to be thankful to my parents, above all 
to my God, for a good education, until I came to 
look into the state of young ladies generally." 

And again, writing to the same loved friend, who 
had partaken with her of the joys she realized in 



96 A MEMOIR 

the residence of her childhood and youth, she says, 
u I wish I could give you any idea of the devotion 
of my heart to home. In the idea of home are con- 
nected all associations of early life, and all that re- 
mains of what I first learned to love. Your beloved 
mother is among the very dearest of all its objects. 
Daily I find my heart giving utterance to its emo- 
tions in the words of the favourite poet of my child- 
hood: 

1 My heart untravelled fondly turns to thee, 
Still to my home returns with ceaseless pain, 
And drags at each remove a lengthening chain.' 

My prayers, my dear friend, you always have; may 
it please God to manifest his power in restoring 
you to that healthfulness of spirit, which alone can 
render this troubled life endurable, and may the 
close of life be with us the gentle decline of the 
setting sun: may we go down together in peace to 
the grave of the earthly body, and rise in the morn- 
ing of the resurrection joyful in the plentiful atone- 
ment and effectual mediation of our Lord and 
Saviour." 

It is certain that her thoughts had often turned 
to the importance of female education for years be- 
fore she entered upon it, and the same impulse 
which led her toward the close of her life to declare 
that she would not for the world abandon her em- 
ployment, taught her, very soon after she realized 
the responsibility which attaches of necessity to the 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 97 

possession of whatever powers we may be endowed 
with, to turn her attention to this subject, and in 
writing to Mrs. Garnet, of Elmwood, before enter- 
ing herself into the same engagement, she says: 
" Do, my beloved, my revered cousin, let me hear 
from you. I would not exchange the pleasure of 
feeling that the friends to whom I am most devoted 
are distinguished for their active benevolence and 
Christian love of their fellow-creatures, not for any 
thing under heaven. Yesterday was our premium 
day at the Sunday School, and fifty children were 
made perfectly happy, as we managed to give all 
some little thing as an encouragement." And there 
is no doubt that the project to which she referred as 
filling her mind, and requiring so many hands to 
carry into execution, entertained before the occur- 
rence of her father's death, was connected with fe- 
male education in some manner. 

The desire to be made instrumental in training 
souls for eternity, was the ruling motive by which 
she was influenced, and from the very first, her 
chief efforts were devoted to this great end, which 
w 7 as pursued without deviation throughout her whole 
career, though by no means to the neglect of those 
subsidiary acquirements which she esteemed as 
highly as any one could do, and laboured most un- 
remittingly to communicate to her pupils. 

Her connexion with Mrs. Garnet's school was 
not of long duration. Close as was her attachment 
9 



98 A MEMOIR 

to the friends by whom it was conducted, the 
promptings of a desire to exercise as wide an influ- 
ence for good as was within the compass of her 
powers, combined with the wish to contribute to 
the comfort of some members of her family espe- 
cially dear to her, induced her to assume an inde- 
pendent position, and she announced to her friends 
her determination to convert the ancestral home at 
Cedar Park into an academy, expecting to receive 
but a limited number of pupils. Yet in the exten- 
sive circle of her acquaintance, so entire was the 
confidence in her powers and peculiar qualifications, 
that she at once received applications from more 
than she had designed taking under her care, and 
having after some difficulty secured the co-opera- 
tion of suitable assistants, during the whole time 
that she continued her residence at West River, she 
had as many pupils as she could accommodate, even 
after the erection of an extensive addition to the 
original mansion. 

Had her object in entering upon the duties of in- 
struction been the acquisition of a pecuniary reward, 
or had she even admitted it as a secondary conside- 
ration into her plan, she had it in her power to at- 
tain it. But hers were loftier motives. It is true 
she had placed herself in a position which rendered 
it incumbent upon her to strain every nerve in or- 
der to meet the engagements into which she had 
voluntarily entered; for, not content with the aban- 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 99 

donment of her own just claims, she had assumed 
the responsibilities of another: but beyond this, it 
may with safety be affirmed, that she never allowed 
a sordid feeling to enter into her plans. A simple, 
holy determination to devote herself to the service 
of God, in training the generations which were to 
come after, in the love and fear of their Creator and 
Redeemer, was the spring, from whose fount the 
perennial stream of her labours of love gushed forth 
with fertilizing power. Nor was she content with 
devoting herself \o this noblest object to which the 
human mind can be applied. Among her friends 
was one of whom she declared that she loved him 
with all the affection of a brother, with whose high 
mental and moral qualification for this calling she 
was well acquainted — the late Daniel Murray, Esq., 
— to whom she thus addressed herself. • • • • "Next 
and last, for on this theme I should never have done, 
had I liberty to say all that my heart suggests, I 
bless my Saviour that He has made you, my dearly 
beloved friends, examples and pioneers in the way 
of Christian duty. It is impossible to express the 
emotions of my soul when it pleases God to make 
the steady light shining more and more to the per- 
fect day, irradiate the whole path through which 
his servant moves. So far, he has worked in you, 
my dear Mr. Murray, <to will and to do of his good 
pleasure/ May you never, never, in thought, or 
word, or deed, swerve for one instant from the ap- 



100 A MEMOIR 

pointed course of your high calling. This course is 
one of unwearied diligence, and my heart and mind 
have been more and more bent, for a long time now, 
upon your becoming the benefactor of mankind in 
undertaking a Fellenberg school. If I did not be- 
lieve, that in rejoicing that God has shown his own 
power in guiding you, I am safe from any danger of 
being misunderstood, I would not say what I do. 
You know and I know where praise and honour be- 
long. But I believe that, like your namesake of 
old, you are ' a man much beloved f and feeling that 
you have freely received, I would urge you, my 
friend, to take it into serious consideration whether 
the peculiar circumstances under which you are at 
this moment placed by the providence of the All- 
wise do not seem to indicate your appointment to 
such a duty. When I think of your own children, 
the advantages which they would derive from such 
an undertaking, of the extent to which you would 
command the confidence of the public, and the in- 
finite increase in future ages of that seed of righte- 
ousness which you might thus widely scatter, and 
thus deeply plant in the hearts of all our children, 
I feel as if I saw too plainly to doubt, the hand, that, 
releasing you from all the cares and anxieties attend- 
ing upon a slave-holder,* affords you at once the 
opportunity of selecting a new mode of life and oc- 
cupation. I heard the other day that General Wal- 

* Mr. Murray had emancipated his negroes. 



OF MISS MARGARET^MERCER. 101 

ter Jones had written to Mr. Fellenberg for a 
teacher, and that he wished a vast mansion which 
he has erected in a fine salubrious situation near 
Washington, to be devoted to that purpose. How 
I should rejoice to hear that you had there, or else- 
where, stationed yourself as the light on the hill to 
guide and guard the little children that Jesus loved 
through the gross darkness of this nether world. 
Just at this time, when the facilities for liberating 
our slaves are so rapidly increasing, the juncture has 
arrived for commencing an agricultural education 
for our boys. My dear Mr. Murray, if you carry 
such a plan into operation, you become the remote 
but positive instrument in releasing generations from 
slavery, who will ever be kept in bondage while 
labour is a degradation in the opinion of their 
masters." 

Mr. Murray's reply can be recovered only by 
inferences from the following letter from Miss Mer- 
cer of a date soon after the last. 

"Thanking you for your kind reply to my last 
presumptuous letter, I must stop to rejoice with you 
on occasion of your present joy. The omnipotent 
Father of mercies has you all under his charge, and 
I feel confident that all His gifts to you are bless- 
ings. But, my dear friend, is not this another mo- 
tive to lay aside, (at the urgent persuasion of your 
friends,) that distrust of yourself, which deprives 
the world of your services, and your children of 

9* 



102 A MEMOIR 

such advantages as would certainly accrue to them 
from your coming into the plans of those who 
would perhaps never think their judgments superior 
to yours, but in a case in which you were to judge 
yourself. If 1 depended on my own opinions solely, 
I should not venture to suggest any thing farther, but 
admit that I might have been swayed by the par- 
tiality of long and most respectful friendship, but I 
have heard the subject discussed by those who were 
most capable of forming a just opinion; and I am 
again impelled to solicit your indulgence while I 
endeavour to combat that opinion of yourself, which, 
like many virtues, must be confined within the 
bounds of utility to preserve its character of virtue. 
I suppose, my dear sir, that we have no more right 
to undervalue the advantages which God has be- 
stowed upon ourselves, than those with which he 
has endowed others of his creatures. To take too 
low views of our pow T ers of usefulness is then a fault, 
and loath as you would be to institute comparisons 
between yourself and others, to their disadvantage, 
yet there are instances in which I believe it is a po- 
sitive duty imposed upon us to do so ; and this I think 
a perfectly legitimate one. Is it not very evident 
that such an institution is the most urgent w T ant of 
our country? That the youth of the Southern 
States demand, especially at this time, the institu- 
tion of such a system of education, as may prepare 
them for the great and good measures, the wisdom 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 103 

and the virtue which are requisite to the safety and 
prosperity of those states. And in whom shall we 
find the man of birth, education, refined manners, 
honourable sentiments, and above all, religious prin- 
ciples, to devote this combination of commanding 
qualities with zeal, fidelity, and talent to this noble 
purpose, if you refuse? I am ashamed to use lan- 
guage to you which may appear like adulation, and 
am endeavouring to guard my pen against enthusi- 
asm ; but in sober earnestness, it is true that all the 
essential requisites of which you have spoken are 
yours, by capacity, if I may so express myself." 

Not one sordid idea, not a suggestion of personal 
advantage, appears to have entered into her calcula- 
tion of the benefits to accrue from the occupation of 
talent in this highest, noblest pursuit, to which hu- 
man talent can be appropriated, and what she thought 
and felt, and urged upon her friend, was the living 
principle on which she acted herself. She looked 
abroad with the eye of a patriot woman, and felt 
with the ardent enthusiasm of one devoted to the 
good of her country, and especially that section of 
it in which her own lot had been cast by the over- 
ruling providence of the one Father of all who dwell 
on the face of the whole earth, — and planned and 
acted on, and urged others to act upon, the most 
disinterested schemes for the benefit of her country 
in the generations yet to come. Man admires, and 
must admire, while he has the sympathies of man, 



104 A MEMOIR 

the virtue which sacrifices life and all that makes 
life dear upon the altar of our country, and patriot 
is the highest grade in human estimation of human 
worth. Miss Mercer was a patriot woman, and 
lived and suffered and virtually bled and died in the 
service of her country. Serving it in a sphere of 
action the most important, yet too commonly the 
least esteemed. Standing at the very fountain of 
influence, and casting in there the healing branch 
which shall cause pure waters to flow over the wide 
domain. It is to the mothers of her sons, that our 
country looks for the impress that is to make them 
her great and her good men, her trusted and her 
honoured servants. To such women as Margaret 
Mercer would we trust the forming of the character 
of those who are thus to give character to our coun- 
try when our part in the drama is performed, and 
we pass for ever from an interest in its actings. May 
her example stir others up to the like consecration 
of their powers. It is the female pass of Thermo- 
pylae. The Salamis of a woman's ambition. 

Allusion has been made to the difficulty encoun- 
tered in procuring suitable teachers to assist in the 
school. A less important though still vexatious 
trouble arose from the necessity for supplying the 
place of the servants whom she liberated and sent 
to Africa, and she was sometimes compelled, in 
order to provide those necessary to the proper ma- 
nagement of the domestic economy of her large 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 105 

establishment, to purchase such as were slaves for 
life ; and then giving them an equitable compen- 
sation for their labour, she afforded them an op- 
portunity to redeem themselves; thus they were 
trained in habits of industry and economy which 
qualified them properly to estimate the value of the 
liberty they acquired, while they were fitted for 
the use and enjoyment of the boon. But in this 
as in all other concerns in which she was engaged, 
she ever regarded her own interest as secondary 
to that of others, and was ready to promote theirs 
even at the sacrifice of her comfort, and at no little 
personal inconvenience. 

Among those thus brought into her household, 
was a coloured man named William Taylor, whose 
superior intelligence and lofty bearing attracted the 
attention not only of Miss Mercer, but of all who 
observed him. In speaking of him, one remarks, 
" his eye was as an open window, radiant with the 
light which shone out from his soul;" and another, 
"I never could look at him and ask him to serve 
me." Such an one could not fail to attract the at- 
tention, and enlist the feelings of Miss Mercer in 
his behalf, and his assiduous attentions in nursing 
the sick, suggested to her the idea of seeking a 
medical education for him, and sending him to mi- 
nister to his emigrant countrymen in Liberia. Her 
own pecuniary circumstances were such as forbade 
her giving up to him the money she had expended 



106 A MEMOIR 

on his redemption; bat she obtained fin him ftfeeess 
to the office of Dr. Lirrsiey. one of the professors 

in the Medical College in Washington city, in order 
that he might there prosecote his n studies; 

and at the same time. i :: 

him to her friends, she secured the 

his evenings as a waiter at en: tents during 

the session of Congress, by which be was enabled 

to support himself, and in part to i 

for her expense in his behalf He proved wc: 

of the interest she had manifested in Bin g 

the period of his studies, and his subseqnc 

dence in Africa, si:e kept up a constant 

ence with him. His letters to he: 

exhibit a vigour of intellect steadfastness 

of purpose, and high-minded, he: nuta- 

tion to pursue his course in dedanre of ser::us : ":- 
stacles^ and great temptation, which ex;i: his 
racter to a high rank. Miss Mercer's letters ::> 
him are unhappily i :s:. but i: is evident ::: m his re- 
plies that she entered intc his feelings with sym- 
pathy, and afforded him counsel is tc his ::urse; her 
efforts were especially directed to the attempt to 
bring him under the influence of the Spirit z: G:.i. 
that he might minister to the souls of his fellows 
while exerting himself foi the relief of their bodily 
dise:srs. He was three years ievoted testa 
Dr. Lindsley. daring which he says, u Dr. Linddey 
pays me as r Mention as he i 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 107 

student; he teaches me Latin for nothing, gives me 
a recitation daily; and makes me perform all the 
ordinary operations, and takes me with him to see 
any important operations." And at another time: 
" Dr. L. constantly advises me, as you have done in 
your last letter, to lose no time, but devote it all to 
storing my mind with every kind of knowledge 
useful and improving. He has quite a good library, 
to which I have access at all times;" and just before 
sailing, he writes: u I feel, Miss Margaret, (not boast- 
ing,) that I shall be of some service in that Colony. 
1 hope that I shall; I know, at all events, if I try to 
do good to my fellow-creatures, with a pure motive, 
that God will aid me, and thus assisted I have no- 
thing to fear; and another thing I remember, that I 
shall have the prayers of all those who are sincerely 
interested in this matter, to help me on. In ac- 
quiring a knowledge of the profession of which I 
have made choice, I have had to labour under many 
and great difficulties, among the most prominent of 
which are a deficiency in knowledge of the con- 
struction of the English language, inaccuracy in 
spelling, w r ant of capacity, and worst of all, want of 
application. So frequently I find myself reading 
that that does not profit, such as newspaper stuff, to 
the entire neglect of my proper study, that I am 
compelled to pass judgment on myself, and thus 
charge myself with the want of proper application. 
Though I have studied hard, I might have studied 



108 A MEMOIR 

harder; and I believe few students have read as many 
books in the same time. I have studied, (not read,) 
all the most important works the Doctor has. I 
have felt frequently the force of your advice in a 
former letter, to read every good book I could get. 
I have done so in a good degree, and one book I am 
now studying, which I am sure you are not ignorant 
of, is Mason on Self-knowledge." 

Every effort was made to deter him from the ful- 
filment of his purpose. The most fearful pictures 
of the mortality among the emigrants were spread 
before him. To this he replied: " I shall persevere 
— what warrant have I, if I draw back, that I shall 
live as long here ? God made the climate what it is." 
Some young men of colour, who were his compa- 
nions in study, withdrew; and their success in 
other pursuits was represented to him as an induce- 
ment to follow their example, and letters to himself 
from disappointed colonists added to the force of the 
appeal. He met it all with, "I am, however, im- 
movable. My purpose is fixed — I have the welfare 
of my fellow-men at heart, and at all hazards I will 
make the experiment. Under the smiles of our 
heavenly Benefactor, I shall not despair. The cause 
is good, my motive pure; with the approbation of 
Heaven, I have nothing to fear." 

With such motives, feelings, and qualifications, 
he sailed for Liberia, where, after some three years 
of labour as a physician and missionary, he died; 






OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 109 

not of the diseases incident to the climate, but of 
consumption, induced by exposure in founding a 
new missionary station among the heathen natives. 
He does not appear ever to have experienced regret 
at the course he pursued. After residing some time 
in the colony, he removed to an out-station, in order 
to devote himself to the evangelization of the hea- 
then. The Rev. Mr. Seys prepared an obituary 
notice of him, which was published in Africa's Lu- 
minary, in which he speaks in high terms of Tay- 
lor's devotedness and usefulness. His last expres- 
sion was one not of regret that he had devoted him- 
self to the cause of Africa, and thus abridged his ca- 
reer of earthly existence; but of desire that he might 
have been permitted still to " lay hold upon the 
work," and help it forward. 

Educated in the midst of slavery, and familiar 
with it under circumstances in which it displayed 
its least exceptionable features, Miss Mercer was 
fully convinced of the evils necessarily inherent in 
the system, and of the malign influence it exerts as 
well upon the master as the slave. She had, how- 
ever, also, at the same time, full opportunity to 
observe the great difficulties with which the effort 
to get rid of the evil is environed, and was able to 
appreciate the obstacles which oppose the full deve- 
lopment of the negro character in a country in 
which he has so long been kept in a state of degra- 
dation, and where he is compelled to contend with 
10 



110 A MEMOIR 

habits and prejudices, not only inveterate from long 
continuance, but constantly excited into renewed 
vigour by the struggle ever maintained between 
distinct races of men dwelling on the same soil. 
She was convinced that circumstances over which 
the friends of the negro have no control, would keep 
him here in a state of thraldom and servitude, even 
though liberated from the galling chain of hopeless 
bondage. Yet none ever felt more deeply the evil 
of slavery; none ever more anxiously desired the 
coming of the time when the stain of it should be 
wiped from the scutcheon of our country; none ever 
made more disinterested self-sacrificing efforts than 
she to be delivered from its guilt. It was with 
such views and feelings she had hailed with delight 
the establishment of the American Colonization So- 
ciety, an institution which she regarded as pecu- 
liarly adapted to the relief of both master and slave. 
Among its founders, none took a more prominent 
part than two of her most intimate friends, Francis 
Scott Key, Esq., and C. Fenton Mercer, Esq., — 
with both of whom she was in frequent correspon- 
dence. It has become of late years the habit of too 
many of the abolitionists of our own country, to 
denounce, in terms of unsufferable harshness, as 
enemies of the negro and advocates of slavery, all 
who cannot adopt their own ultra views, nor engage 
in measures for the remedy of the evil of slavery 
which violate the Constitution of our country, threat- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. Ill 

en a dissolution of the Union, and are fraught with 
mischief alike to the master and the slave. Terms 
of contempt and abuse are hurled, with indiscrimi- 
nate rancour, at the south and slaveholders, without 
regard to the circumstances which distinguish them 
from each other. Those who, without their own 
volition, find themselves, by the circumstances of 
their birth, involved in the toils of slavery, are in- 
cluded in the same wholesale denunciation with the 
most abandoned wretches w T ho disgrace the name 
of man; and the opponent of slavery, who is so un- 
happy as to have his lot cast in the midst of it, is 
compelled, by a sense of justice to his neighbour, 
and abhorrence of the wrong done by these indis- 
criminate denunciations, to assume a position adverse 
to his wishes, and subject himself to the imputation 
of friendly feeling toward a system he abhors, and 
would fain see overthrown. Nor is this injustice 
confined to our own country. The same sentiment 
is re-echoed from the other side of the Atlantic, 
with a sound scarce diminished by the distance, 
though softened to our ears by the conviction that 
it is there uttered in ignorance of the character of 
those thus assailed, and of the circumstances in 
which they find themselves. By these mistaken 
friends of the negro, all who cannot sanction mea- 
sures of the most radical kind, are branded as advo- 
cates of slavery, and accused of hypocrisy in the 
expression of feelings they do not possess, while 



112 A MEMOIR 

their real desire is said to be to remove from our 
country the free negro, in order to rivet more closely 
the bonds of the slave. 

Bishop White, the advocate of slavery, and the 
hypocritical pretender to friendship for the negro, 
that he might the more firmly rivet upon him the 
galling chain of hopeless bondage! Bishop Meade, 
a participator in so nefarious a plot, though the 
emancipator of his servants! The very charge is 
so extreme, as to carry with it its own refutation to 
all who ever knew them; and yet Bishops White 
and Meade were the constant, ardent friends of Af- 
rican colonization, and that not only from the ex- 
pectation of prospective benefit to Africa, but from 
an honest conviction of its benign influence upon 
her children here, in the land of their bondage and 
degradation. 

But if there was no other evidence of the utter 
falsehood of the charge alleged against the friends 
of colonization, -Margaret Mercer was during her 
life, and will be so long as her memory shall endure, 
a shining testimony of the fact that the society was 
countenanced in its origin and supported to the pre- 
sent hour by persons who were ready at any cost,- — 
nay more, at any sacrifice of their own comfort, — to 
promote the good of those in whom they recognised 
the traits c-f common brotherhood, though u guilt}' 
of a skin not coloured like their own ; ,J and the 
combined ranks of modern abolitionism, at home 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 113 

and abroad, may with safety be challenged to pro- 
duce a nobler spirit than that which burned within 
her bosom, and urged her on to untiring labours 
for the benefit of the slave. Its first act, was the 
emancipation of the slaves who came into her pos- 
session by the law of inheritance, and that under 
circumstances which compel us to class this act, 
without any figure of speech, with that of the widow 
so commended of our Lord: "She gave all she had, 
even all her living.' 5 Nor was this one fitful, spas- 
modic effort of impulse. We shall exhibit her own 
testimony to the solid principle on which it was 
founded, — a principle which knew no change, and 
which operated with undiminished power to the 
last. Only a few years before her death, a poor 
creature, who had been sold by his master to a 
southern trader, was dragged from his home, (and 
who will deny that home has its charms of asso- 
ciation in even the uncultivated bosom of the de- 
graded slave?) and passing in the stage by Belmont, 
exclaimed, "Ah! if [Miss Mercer knew what I suf- 
fer, she would help me!" begging the driver to stop, 
and permit him to present an appeal to her charity, 
the reputation of which had reached him. This 
was denied him. But even the rugged spirit of the 
driver was moved, and on his return he mentioned 
the circumstance, so that it reached Miss Mercers 
ear. She lost no time, but though without money 
herself, she at once borrowed three hundred dollars, 
10* 



114 A MEMOIR 

the sum necessary for his redemption, and hastened 
with it in person to the place to which he had been 
conveyed. It was, however, too late to effect her 
purpose, as he had already been transported beyond 
the reach of her charitable effort. Was this the 
action of one wishing " to remove the free negro 
from our own soil, only that the chain might be 
riveted the more firmly on those who remained ?" 
One such action does more to soften the heart of 
the slaveholder, and open his eyes to the evil of 
slavery, and relax the thraldom of the slave, than 
all the angry denunciations and paper crusades of 
those who, without personal sacrifice, sit in selfish 
security by their own hearths, and fan into fury a 
flame which, once kindled, shall overleap all bounds, 
and whelm in common destruction the master and 
the slave. Miss Mercer's determination to trans- 
port to Liberia all her slaves who could be induced 
to go there voluntarily, originated in an honest, 
deeply-rooted opinion that their happiness would be 
promoted by the change, founded on the observation 
of instances, in which some, emancipated without 
that preparatory training necessary to qualify them 
to provide for themselves, fell into evil habits, which 
involved them in ruin. Such as refused to emigrate 
were emancipated here, and over those who went 
to Africa, she ever watched with the most anxious 
interest; and years after, she mentions the delight 
occasioned by the return of one, since "from him 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 115 

she could learn the condition of the rest." Their 
own feeling of gratitude to her is beautifully exhi- 
bited by the fact, related by an eye-witness, that 
upon hearing a (false) report of her death, they all 
clothed themselves in the habiliments of grief. 

Thus Mrs. Minor, who resided some years in 
Africa, relates: — "Upon my first arrival at Cape 
Palmas, there were many coloured people there 
who had been liberated by their kind mistress from 
the cruel shackles of slavery. They flocked to the 
mission house at Mount Vaughan, fresh in their 
sable weeds, and anxiously begging that I would 
give them some further information of ' Miss Mar- 
garet/ When they spoke of her death, I told them 
she was still living when I left America, and ad- 
vised them to lay aside their mourning, (such as 
could be procured in the colony, black strings and 
crape bands.) This was indeed joyful news to 
them: one said, < Write, madam, then, and ask her 
to send me just the side of her face in a picture;' 
and then followed such protestations of attachment 
for their dear 'Miss Margaret/ as would be too 
tedious to write. Upon my return, in the fall of 
1844, I mentioned the above circumstance to Miss 
Mercer. She manifested much sensibility on the 
subject at first, and was deeply affected at this ex- 
hibition of feeling on the part of her too often de- 
spised friends ; but soon recovering her elasticity 
of spirits, she talked freely on that subject ever 



116 A MEMOIR 

nearest her heart, and which I have heard her again 
and again say was to her mind the greatest cause on 
earth, — colonization of the free blacks. She was 
then the most interesting female I had ever seen ; 
her countenance, manners, and conversation por- 
trayed the beauty of her ever-active mind ; and I 
left her saying to myself, * This is Christianity. 5 " 

Mr. Gurley, who was Secretary of the Coloniza- 
tion Society at the time Miss Mercer sent her eman- 
cipated servants to Liberia, has furnished copies of 
two letters written to him by her respecting them. 
Would that they could be published in their inte- 
grity! This would involve an unwarrantable ex- 
posure of subjects of a nature too personal for the 
public eye; but two short extracts may be given 
as illustrative of the spirit by which she was actu- 
ated: 

"I hope for the blessing of God on our united ef- 
forts to do good, and I trust much to the efficacy of 
prayers offered by the faithful for the success of our 
endeavours/ 5 

This emancipation of her slaves was one of a chain 
of acts inseparably linked together, by which she 
reduced herself from affluence to absolute depen- 
dence on her own exertions for maintenance, and 
that not ignorantly and gradually, but instantly and 
with full knowledge of the inevitable result, She 
therefore apologizes to Mr. Gurley for doing so lit- 
tle for them, and remarks : " Should any think I 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. * 117 

have not done my part by these poor creatures, I 
can but bear the blame silently, A formal remon- 
strance against my making such a disposition of my 

property has been addressed to me by and 

. Had it been any thing but human flesh 

and blood, souls belonging to the God that made 
them, I should have yielded. But I have deter- 
mined to abide the consequences." These conse- 
quences were anxiety, toil, and poverty, endured 
without a murmur or regret, during twenty-five 
years of life enfeebled by constant disease. These 
sacrifices for Africa, and her efforts in behalf of the 
negro race, were alone sufficient to place her name 
high on the roll of female philanthropists. Allusion 
has already been made to the peculiar beauty of the 
products of her pencil and needle. These were 
ever ready in the service of the cause ; and when 
the care of young ladies placed her in a position of 
influence over them, she incited and encouraged 
them to emulate her efforts. Soon after the open- 
ing of her school, she established a society among 
her pupils for the purpose of promoting education 
among the colonists, membership in which was to 
be constituted by the contribution of work of not 
less value than ten dollars per annum, which was to 
be disposed of at annual fairs to be held at the school. 
The proceeds of these sales, which were continued 
for several years, constituted a fund respecting the 
employment of which she had much anxiety, and 



118 A MEMOIR 

consulted with several eminent advocates of colo- 
nization. At one time she procured, through a friend 
in Baltimore, a correspondence with a gentleman of 
well-known benevolence, John Ross. Esq.. of Glas- 
gow, Scotland, with a view of ascertaining what ad- 
vantages would accrue from sending some intelligent 
coloured boys to that country to be educated, with 
a design of sending them afterwards to Liberia as 
teachers or physicians. Mr. Ross entered into the 
scheme with much energy, and secured the co-ope- 
ration of a gentleman who was well qualified, and 
willing to receive the beneficiaries into his family, 
and superintend their education. Miss Mercer ac- 
cordingly addressed a circular to each of the young 
ladies who had participated in the benefit of her in- 
structions from the first opening of her school, in- 
forming them that the sum necessary to the accom- 
plishment of this purpose was not less than eight or 
nine hundred dollars per annum, and then pro- 
ceeds: 

"To raise the sum specified among you, would 
require only such an individual contribution as the 
smallest child might annually obtain by her needle. 

"'Remembering, therefore, how assiduously and 
affectionately I have laboured among you all to instil 
a deep sense of your responsibility to the common 
Parent of us all, for the faithful performance of the 
duty enjoined upon us to give the gospel to the 
heathen, and to do good to all men as we have the 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 119 

opportunity, I do beseech that you will not refuse 
to unite with me in this good work and labour of 
love. In doing so you will most acceptably evince 
your attachment to, and impart the highest gratifi- 
cation you can confer upon your truly and tenderly 
attached friend and preceptress, 

"Margaret Mercer." 

The plan of sending lads to Scotland for educa- 
tion was abandoned, but not her interest in the object. 
Indeed, she might well be adduced as an illustrious 
example of that perseverance in well doing, which 
lias ever been recognised, as well by the heathen 
moralist as the inspired apostle, as an essential in- 
gredient in the character of virtue. Having exa- 
mined carefully her ground, and entered on it from 
motives of principle, she adhered to it to the end. 
Even the fraud of those in whom she confided, and 
who professed to aim at the same object, did not 
deter her, nor abate her determined zeal in the cause. 
She watched over the growth of the fund which ac- 
crued from the sales with great care, but found no 
mode for employing it to advantage, until she ob- 
served a notice in a New York paper of the organi- 
zation of a Young Men's Colonization Society in 
that city; that it had resolved to establish a high 
school in Liberia, and that the proposal had met 
with much favour; no less than fifteen thousand dol- 
lars having been promptly subscribed for this pur- 



120 A MEMOIR 

pose. She at once put herself in correspondence 
with the accredited agent of this body, rejoicing in 
the prospect of the accomplishment of a hope so dear 
and so long entertained. She soon after had a let- 
ter from the same person, dated at Washington, in- 
forming her that he was at that place on business 
connected with the enterprise; that a vessel was 
chartered and about to sail having on board the 
frame of the building for a college; that all things 
were in favourable progress, and asking for the 
transfer of the money in her hands. Unhappily this 
request was complied with. The agent proved 
treacherous, and the long-hoarded and anxiously- 
watched fund was squandered by a worthless impos- 
tor. Few circumstances in life caused her more 
grief and indignation. She resorted to every means 
in her power to recover the money, and always ex- 
pressed her conviction that as she had confided not 
in the individual, but in the authorized agent of a 
responsible society, that society was accountable for 
the debt, and writing to a friend whom she employ- 
ed still to prosecute this purpose for her, after the 
lapse of some years, she says: In an unhappy hour 
I signed away to the agent of the young gentlemen 
of New York the produce of years of self-denial, 
and industry, and active charity, and from that day 
to this I have never been able to learn that even a 
single individual of this society regarded this act of 
fraud committed in their name, and by their autho- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER, 121 

rized agent, upon a society of benevolent ladies, as 
worthy of the slightest notice. Not so, hovve^r, 
with me; I feel bound in conscience to repair the 
effects of my imprudence in the trust reposed on me, 
and the very moment in which I obtain the means 
of doing so, I shall refund the whole sum from the 
profits of my labour." Such was her high sense 01 
moral responsibility. 

Her views on the subject of slavery, and the best 
means for the promotion of its abolition, may be ga- 
thered from the following extracts from her corre- 
spondence with Gerrit Smith, Esq., of Peterborough, 
New York. Some years after the emancipation of her 
servants, she received from Mr. Smith the present 
of a book, which became the occasion of their inter- 
course. Mr. Smith was at that time a warm advo- 
cate and liberal supporter of the colonization cause, 
though he subsequently changed his views entirely. 

u One of the greatest encouragements to hope that 
Christians meet with in this world, is the full mea- 
sure, heaping over, which men pay into their bosom, 
for the least act of love to God or to their fellow- 
creatures. Often I ask myself what mighty thing 
hast thou done that praise and honour have followed 
thee? And truly I can find nothing to entitle me 
to such a gratification, as I felt a few days since in 
receiving a little book with a few lines traced in 
pencil, by the hand of one whose name I have long 
held in high and grateful association, It is not, dear 
11 



122 A MEMOIR 

sir, in my nature to soil with adulation the purity of 
that which I love, May the 'God who loveth a 
cheerful giver* be himself your great and sure re- 
ward. For myself, I disclaim the merit of being 
disinterested in my efforts for the colonization cause. 
Although under other circumstances I hope I might 
have done as you have. Yet the enemy who said, 
'Doth Job serve God for naught?* may surely say 
the same of me. My personal advantages in pro- 
moting the removal of slaves from our unhappy 
country is too immediate not to detract most evi- 
dently from my motives. Perhaps this is my re- 
ward; for considering as I do the Colonization So- 
ciety as the only possible means of reconciling the 
South to the subject of emancipation, and knowing 
by experience how much the subject is growing in 
the affections of at least Maryland and Virginia, I 
should perhaps be too highly exalted by the honour 
of being named among the promoters of the most 
blessed of Christian institutions, could I for one mo- 
ment lose sight of the self-interest which suggests 
continually the great weight of responsibility which 
rests upon the conscience of the slave-holder, and 
the awful retribution which we suffer in the corrup- 
tion of children brought up among slaves. Indeed, 
my dear sir, I consider the evil of slavery as falling 
quite as much upon slave-holders as the slaves, and 
I really wish some of the incendiary abolitionists of 
the North were invested with all the rights, privi- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 123 

leges, and duties of a large landed estate for twelve 
months. If at the expiration of the term they did 
not confess their Southern neighbours were much 
more forgiving and patient with slaves than they 
themselves could be, the experiment would be dif- 
ferent from any similar one which I have seen 
tried." 

The correspondence thus commenced was kept 
up during several years, and the letters which passed 
between them are marked by kindly expressions of 
common interest in a cause esteemed of the highest 
importance by both, and give evidence of mutual 
esteem and respect. 

Mr. Smith, in acknowledging the receipt of that 
from which we have just made an extract, says: 
"The Colonization Society is by its constitution 
debarred from making direct attacks on slavery, and 
that such attacks should be made on a system, so 
full of evil, I have no doubt. But these attacks 
should be made in a spirit of intelligence and kind- ■ 
ness, and Christian forbearance. The Anti-slavery 
Society will be doing a great amount of unmixed 
good, when it shall confine itself to the work of ad- 
dressing temperate and judicious publications to the 
consciences of all men on the subject of slavery. 
But the tendency of many of their publications is 
unhappily to irritate the slave-holder, and to render 
him more and more inaccessible to good influence. 
My great hope that our Society, (the American 



124 A MEMOIR 

Colonization Society,) will contribute largely to 
loosen the bands of slavery in this country, is 
founded on its work in Africa. The reflex influence 
of great improvement in Africa, on her outcast chil- 
dren here, will be mighty. Give her a place among 
the nations of the earth, class her with Great Britain 
and France, and it will be as morally impossible for 
us to hold her children in bondage, as it is now to 
reduce to involuntary servitude a Briton or a 
Frenchman." Mr. Smith took a warm interest in 
Miss Mercer's project for the education of young 
men to be employed as teachers in Africa, and this 
afforded the theme for several letters in which Miss 
Mercer's views on slavery were distinctly stated in 
strong terms. But though they agreed fully in its 
condemnation, they diverged more and more on the 
mode by which the evil was to be remedied. Miss 
Mercer cleaving to the Colonization Society as 
" God's own work," and believing it to " afford the 
.only means of reconciling the South to emancipa- 
tion," whilst Mr. Smith gradually withdrew from 
the advocacy of it, and even assumed a position of 
open hostility. The one dwelt in the midst of 
slavery, and saw and felt for the painful position in 
which many who were involved in it were placed, 
yet was never beguiled by her interest in the master 
to forego her anxiety for the good of the slave. 
Whilst the other, living aloof, and looking at it 
through media which distorted the object at which 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 125 

he was gazing, thinking only of the one party, over- 
looked what was due to the other. Miss Mercer 
felt truly the difficulty of the position of the con- 
scientious master, and knew well that there were 
such. Mr. Smith looked only at the wickedness 
perpetrated under the influence of the system, and 
forgot that there were many reluctantly involved in 
it, and others, who while they were not fully awa- 
kened to the evil of it, were yet as much shocked 
as himself at atrocities which he ascribed to the sys- 
tem, and for which all were held responsible who 
did not enter into the violent and impracticable 
measures which were proposed by Northern aboli- 
tionists. 

In one of her letters she thus expresses herself: 
"I do not know why we should be provoked at the 
virulent abuse of such men as Garrison; but it is 
not in human nature to hear your good, evil spoken 
of, and not be indignant, and though I am convinced 
the violence of the attacks has been of great service 
to our cause in this country, yet it is very painful 
to think that such a man as Wilberforce should have 
been so cruelly prejudiced against us. I must agree 

with as far as I know any thing of anti-slavery 

proceedings, being obliged to judge of the tree by 
its fruits. I have seen no effect produced on any one 
individual slave-holder by their intemperate and 
arrogant publications, but exasperation against those 
faults of slaves, which all who have any acquaint- 

11* 



126 A MEMOIR 

ance with the subject know to exist I am afraid to 
talk much upon this subject, for I fear I also may 
express myself too warmly, thinking that for me 
there would be an apology in the dangers produced 
by these incendiaries. For while the well-disposed 
and faithful servants of kind masters will suffer and 
die with the whites in a general insurrection, the 
lawless and vicious will have in their power to mas- 
sacre men, women, and children, in their sleep. 
This is my apology for feeling and expressing the 
deepest indignation against the man who dares to 
throw the fire-brand into the powder magazine, 
while all are asleep, and stands himself at a distance 
to see the mangled victims of his barbarous fury. I 
pray you, dear sir, in the strength of your benevo- 
lence, to conceive the state of families living remote 
from assistance in the country. Suppose, as I have 
often witnessed, an alarm of insurrection; think of 
the mother of a family startled from her sleep by 
some unusual noise, and seized with the horrid ap- 
prehension of the scene which may await her in a 
few minutes. — But we will leave this exciting topic. 
I had intended to send you just a single sheet, and 
have, under the powerful vibration of this string, 
been moved to transgress, not I hope Christian pa- 
tience, but prudence. The great foundation of all 
my belief is that God by a transmuting power turns 
all evil into good; trusting in this, I wait upon Him. 
But, really, the incivility of these fanatics is worthy 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 127 

of remark." She then comments with strong feel- 
ings of disgust upon a pamphlet which had been 
sent to her by mail, and proceeds: "Do not for a 
moment doubt that slavery is in ?ny mind a direct 
violation of Christianity, but if it is according to 
the holiness of God to bear long with the wicked 
and idolatrous world, why should we attempt to ef- 
fect the good work in an hour, any more than the 
conversion of the heathen nations? I will never, so 
help me Heaven, turn away from the promotion of 
the first wish of my soul, the abolition of slavery 
in the United States, any more than I will turn 
away from the duty of persuading all men to be re- 
conciled to God. But I will temper my zeal with 
as much discretion as my nature possesses. Excuse 
me, my much-respected friend, if I have expressed 
myself with unbecoming warmth. You say you 
know me well; alas, it is well for me you do not 
know how very full of sin are my very best ser- 
vices." It was some three years after this that Miss 
Mercer received through the post-office, directed to 
herself, a pamphlet of which Mr. Smith was the au- 
thor, and she supposed sent to her by himself, on the 
subject of slavery, in which he enumerated some of 
the most atrocious acts of wickedness which could be 
raked from the annals of Southern crime, and em- 
ployed them in his argument, as though there were no 
Southern slave-holders who viewed them with the 
same detestation as himself; and as though similar 



12S A MEMOIR 

crimes were not perpetrated by persons equally desti- 
tute of principle in states where slavery is unknown; 
overlooking the truth, which would appear so plain 
that it must present itself to every thoughtful mind, 
that these crimes had their origin not in slavery, but 
in human iniquity, and that slavery merely gave 
them the peculiar colour which resulted from the 
circumstances in which they were committed. Miss 
Mercer felt strongly indignant at this indiscriminate 
condemnation, and especially grieved at w T hat she 
construed into a personal application of it to herself 
in the transmission to her of the pamphlet. She 
mourned too, with heartfelt grief, over the sad results 
which she foresaw must follow such a course, in ex- 
citing the evil passions of the master, and thus ren- 
dering more galling and hopeless the bondage of the 
slava. She therefore wrote to Mr. S. in strong 
terms of condemnation, and adds: 

" This very morning 1 have prayed that your 
dogmatical, opinionated, persecuting spirit might be 
changed for one more calculated to do good. We 
have exchanged expressions of friendship and sym- 
pathy which I shall never forget, and in remem- 
brance I must beg you to forbear extending to me 
in their circulation things which to my mind are 
equally wrong and injurious. May God bless you, 
dear sir, and direct you into a way more calculated 
to effect His will upon earth, which is always peace 
and good will among men. Sincerely and respect- 
fullv, your friend." 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 129 

A reply, equally temperate and respectful, was 
returned by Mr. Smith, who says: "I do not greatly 
wonder at the spirit of the letter I received from 
you. Indeed, it is not a little creditable to you, 
that, considering the circumstances, it is tempered 
with so much moderation and kindness. I gather 
from your language, that it is a copy of my letter 
to Dr. Smylie jthat you have been reading. I do 
not know whence you received it. In it I have 
endeavoured to show that American slavery is sin. 
It is not surprising that such an attempt should be 
offensive to one who resides in a slave State, and 
whose dearest friends are probably, most of them, 
slave-holders. I am happy that your temper has 
been no more ruffled by this attempt. I never had 
cause to respect you more highly and to love you 
more sincerely than I now have. That, under cir- 
cumstances so calculated to lead you to dislike me, 
your letter should still manifest your respect and 
kindness and Christian love for me, is what I expect 
from Margaret Mercer, but not from a large portion 
of those who are unhappily connected either per- 
sonally or through their families, with slavery. I 
hope, if ever you come to the North, you will visit 
Gerrit Smith, and allow him the gratification of a 
kind and frank conversation with you on the subject 
of American slavery. If my letter is unhappily 
characterized, as you think it is, by a dogmatical, 
opinionated, persecuting spirit, I feel very confident 



130 A MEMOIR 

you will find this spirit does not prevail, and is not 
habitual in me. 

"I thank you that you remember me in your 
prayers. I need your remembrance before the 
mercy seat, for I am a guilty sinner. Especially 
pray for me that I may have a hundred fold more 
sympathy for the Saviour's enslaved poor, and for 
those who oppress them. One of the great sins of 
my life is the smallness of the compassion 1 have 
felt for the slave and the slave-holder. And now, 
my dear friend, allow me, in all kindness and love, 
to beg you to pray to God to enlighten your own 
mind in respect to the nature of American slavery. 
Do ask Him to teach you whether a system which 
turns man — immortal, godlike man — into a thing, 
a marketable commodity — which forbids him the 
reading of the Bible, and the sacred rights of the 
marriage institution, is sinful or not. If He teach 
you that it is sinful, then you and I are agreed. 
Be assured that so soon as you are convinced that 
the system of American slavery is contrary to God's 
word, no important differences between us on the 
subject of slavery will remain. You will then read 
my work and say amen to every page of it. Rely 
on it, here is the source, the starting-point of our 
differences on this subject. You have vague and 
unsettled notions of the moral character of American 
slavery — now half-condemning it — now excusing it. 
I, on the contrary, am thoroughly convinced that 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 131 

slavery is sin — nay, more, is heinous wickedness — 
nay, more, is the most wicked system that the ava- 
rice, and lust, and tyranny of the human heart ever 
devised. With admiration and love for one who 
has given so many proofs of possessing a noble phi- 
lanthropy, and w T ith a strong hope that she will yet 
plead the cause of the slave, because he is wickedly, 
most wickedly, wronged, trodden down, and de- 
spised, I remain your friend." 

To this letter, impressed, doubtless, with the evi- 
dences of Christian meekness, and exonerating him- 
self from the charge of having given occasion to 
her personal feeling by sending the pamphlet to her, 
Miss Mercer thus responds: 

Dear Sir, — 

After having, as a vindication of the modesty of 
my character, assured you that your pamphlet came 
to my address here as if sent by you from New 
York, I would, as wisely guided by Him who was 
sileyit, and opened not his mouth, refrain from re- 
plying, when a reply would be only a vain repeti- 
tion. There is only over-evidence of that excessive 
zeal of which abolitionists are accused in your 
letter, which duty to myself requires me to answer. 
You speak of my not being opposed to slavery, or 
thinking it no sin. Sir, from the bottom of my 
heart, I believe at this moment I am more opposed 
to slavery than you are! ! ! I believe that I would 



132 A MEMOIR 

do more, if personal sacrifice would avail, to put 
an end to African slavery. But neither you nor I 
are God, that we should be able to root out the 
tares and leave the wheat growing; and I am, and 
always shall be of the opinion that you want that 
humility which trusts to the mild, prevailing effect 
of Christian doctrine to work a gradual change, 
and because the work does not go on to please you, 
Jehu-like, you would seize the reins, and drive the 
chariot of the sun out of heaven. If slavery is sin, 
it is not the sin you make it. You might as justly 
and wisely call it burglary, or bigamy, or any thing 
else ; and such injudicious epithets of contemptuous 
obloquy injure the cause in which they are used. A 
parent dies and leaves an infant his slaves. The 
law takes possession of the heir and the inheritance, 
and the child is supported and educated from the 
hire of those slaves, and finally the law, when he 
comes of age, formally invests him with possession 
of his inheritance, and you call hi?n a thief. Why, 
w r hat strange definitions must be contained in your 
dictionary! Or, take a stronger case, and by far 
the most common case in our unhappy country. 
A son is left the inheritance of slaves and debts, 
and the law compels him to pay the debts, before 
he can liberate the slaves. He may sell them, it is 
true, and enrich himself: but he is perhaps as hu- 
mane as Gerrit Smith, and he loves — ay he loves 
his servants, and he struggles through a life of hard- 



OJ MISS MARGARET MERCER. 133 

ships to prevent their being sold: nevertheless, he 
is branded as a thief. This last case, sir, was that 
of a near neighbour and friend of mine. Dear sir, 
you are strengthening the hands of oppression, — 
you are filling a nation with rancour and deadly 
enmities, — you are pouring out phials of wrath upon 
the miserable objects of your care, — and you will 
be answerable to God for all that you might have 
done by a different course, since a course of violent 
contention is neither justified by the word, nor the 
example of our Master. I am, and have been since 
my childhood, entirely, and at all times opposed to 
slavery. But I am more so to your mode of get- 
ting rid of the evil. Rather might the tares grow 
till the day of judgment than I unite to extirpate 
them with ungodly violence. You are still Gerrit 
Smith, and I feel that while Liberia is dear to me 
as the apple of mine eye, I must ever feel that I am 
your grieved, your offended, but your affectionate 
friend, M. Mercer. 

" Consider every expression contained in my last 
as still the expression of my heart. May the Prince 
of Peace reign supreme in your soul; and may He 
show you whenever you wound Him, by departing 
from his meek and lowly spirit. May He love you 
and keep you close to Himself, and may He let no 
pharisaical confidence in your own righteousness 
be your temptation. When men know that they do 
12 



134 A MEMOIR 

more than others, they are often most in danger. 
Do not think I do not pray thus for myself- — nay, 
if I were not in Christ, I should certainly not have 
written this letter, for when I act from impulse, I 
always sin. Farewell until all differences are set- 
tled in Christ's judgment of truth." 

It must be borne in mind that this letter, of which 
Mr. Smith himself testifies, " it was the warm ex- 
pression of an honest heart," was not intended for 
any other eye than that of him to whom it was 
addressed. Her actions had proved that she had 
reason to speak strongly of her hatred of slavery, as 
equal to that of Mr. S. If, then, upon such enemies 
of slavery as Miss Mercer, the letter to Dr. Smylie 
produced an effect so foreign to the avowed object 
of the abolitionists, what but still stronger hostility 
to their measures could result from the yet more 
exceptionable works which have since issued from 
the North ? How much greater must be the irrita- 
tion of those not yet convinced, as she was, of the 
sinfulness of slavery! Strange that such results 
should not have curbed the rampart enthusiasm of 
their erring course. 

During ten years she continued with eminent 
success to conduct her school amid the scenes of her 
childhood, and in the halls sanctified to her by the 
long residence of parents most fondly loved in their 
lives, whose memory was cherished with the great- 
est veneration, and whose mortal remains rested 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 135 

within the grounds. But in addition to the circum- 
stances which endear scenes the least attractive in 
themselves, and clothe with the charms of associa- 
tion the least picturesque landscape, Cedar Park 
was possessed of beauties both of nature and of art, 
which made it essentially appropriate to the pur- 
poses to which it was thus devoted. The outspread 
waters of the river rolled before the door, flowing 
into the Chesapeake, whose broad bosom lay- 
stretched out toward the horizon, bearing upon it 
the constantly passing commerce of the third city 
in the Union, while immediately around the mansion 
was a park of several hundred acres, clothed in the 
richest verdure, kept ever cropped by a numerous 
herd of fallow deer, scattered over its undulated 
surface diversified with forest trees. It was a scene 
in which the mind could not but expand, and the 
heart find improvement from the objects by which 
it was surrounded. But in the year 1834 the 
growth of her brother's family, who resided with 
her, and her desire to promote their comfort, in- 
duced Miss Mercer to change her residence. The 
only alternative was to dismiss her train of teachers, 
limit exceedingly the number of her pupils, and 
thus diminish the extent of her usefulness, and 
abandon the pursuit to which she had consecrated 
her life, and devoted her energies. For a short time 
she removed to Franklin, in the vicinity of Balti- 
more, under the impression that in the neighbour- 



136 A MEMOIR 

hood of that city she should secure more competent 
assistance in some branches of education, and there- 
fore obtain a still larger amount of patronage. In 
these expectations she was disappointed, and she 
found that whilst her expenses were much increased, 
there was not a corresponding increase in the num- 
ber of her pupils, and she shortly transferred her 
establishment to Belmont, near Leesburg, in Vir- 
ginia, where she purchased a dilapidated mansion, 
in a secluded position, and had it fitted up with 
every convenience for her purpose. 

The neighbourhood was one which possessed no 
attractions. Far removed from any persons of cul- 
tivated mind or congenial feelings, nearly six miles 
from any place of public worship, her only near 
neighbours persons of limited intelligence, and des- 
titute of any sympathy with her views and efforts 
for their benefit, no situation could have presented 
fewer points of attraction. It was the autumn when 
she entered upon its occupation, with a very limited 
number of pupils, and under circumstances calcu- 
lated to damp the ardour of the most energetic. 
One of the assistants, in referring to it afterward, 
remarked, " That was a sad, dark winter indeed." 

But it was the rising of the sun dispelling the 
mist, and exhibiting the dark rough points of the 
uncultivated valley, only to cause the seed which 
lay dormant to germinate, and the solitary place to 
be glad, and the wilderness to blossom as the rose. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 137 

Miss Mercer could not confine her attention to her 
pupils alone, and sit down inactive, surrounded by 
moral and intellectual evil, without making an effort 
for its removal; and though at the first those efforts 
were misunderstood, and her purposes thwarted, in 
the end, she was enabled to triumph in the accom- 
plishment of her designs. It was a favourite theory 
with her that nothing can withstand the influence 
of love. Thus she writes: 

"I am persuaded that none can be saved but 
those who love God ; and there are so few who do 
not love every thing and any thing better than God, 
that I must suppose the great object of religious in- 
struction is to teach them to love God. They think 
they do love Him, but where among the teachers, 
the preachers, the professors of our faith, do we find 
a love of God prevailing over a love of the world ? 
Where do we find a child of God acquiescing joy- 
fully in the will of his Father, be that will what it 
may, because it is his will ? Where do we find a 
woman loving her God as many a woman loves 
her husband, having no pleasure in any thing which 
interferes with his pleasure? Now such is the con- 
stitution of human nature, that we can never feel 
this love for God until we are deeply impressed 
with a belief in his love for us — his all-prevailing 
love. * * * * I believe that the most desperate vil- 
lain that exists would be more impressed by a visit 
from an angel of light, than a fiend from hell. I 

12* 



13S A MEMOIR 

believe that none can come except they be drawn 
of the Father, and that this attraction is in a con- 
templation of his goodness, his wisdom, and his 
power." Applying this principle to her own prac- 
tice, she strove to draw those under her influence 
to a love for herself, that so she might win them to 
the love of God. She ministered to their wants, 
and comforted them in their distresses, and when 
they repaid her efforts for their benefit with insult 
and reproach, she still poured the fire of love upon 
their heads, until the hardness of the natural heart 
was subdued, and they were brought not only to 
acknowledge her good designs towards them, but 
still further to " glorify her Father in heaven." 
With this view she paid most liberally for the pro- 
duce of the labour of her new neighbours, for which 
her large establishment created a market. She pro- 
cured an instructress, and established a school for 
their children who were growing up in ignorance 
and vice. She instructed them in agriculture and 
domestic economy, and induced the young ladies 
under her care to distribute their children among 
them as wards, over whom they were to watch, and 
train them in habits of neatness and virtue ; and 
destitute as they were of all religious instruction, 
she threw open to them the halls of her own house 
at the period of worship there, until by an effort, 
which cannot be appreciated except by those who 
witnessed it and knew the circumstances in which 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 139 

it was made, she was enabled to accomplish the 
desire of her soul, and saw a church consecrated 
especially to the worship of " the great God our 
Saviour," and regularly supplied with the ministra- 
tions of the gospel. 

One who partook of the same spirit by which 
she was actuated, and entered heartily into her plans, 
speaking of these events, writes: 

" The good our dear Miss Mercer effected in 
this neighbourhood should form a prominent part 
in a sketch of her life. On her first coming here, 
she found the people destitute of nearly every spiri- 
tual and temporal comfort; but by her own personal 
and persevering exertions amongst them, a most 
pleasing and striking change is now apparent. It 
was many years before her most energetic efforts for 
the erection of the little Belmont church were blessed 
with success, but during the whole of her residence 
here, her house was open to the neighbourhood on 
the Sabbath, and all were invited freely to attend 
the family services. At first these people were so 
ignorant of even the external duties of religion as 
frequently to interrupt our worship by their rude 
and disorderly conduct; now, our pastor and other 
clergymen who occasionally visit us, say they never 
preached to a more attentive and orderly congre- 
gation. This change is of course to be entirely 
attributed to our dear Miss Mercer's persevering 
efforts for their improvement. By her liberal re- 



140 A MEMOIR 

numeration of their services, and personal attention 
to their domestic comfort, the temporal condition of 
the neighbourhood has been greatly improved, and 
many comfortable little tenements erected since the 
encouragement afforded by her to honest industry. 
The ingratitude or unworthy conduct of those she 
wished to befriend never checked her benevolent 
efforts for their good ; on the contrary, she never 
failed to rebuke those who urged her on this account 
to give up her interest in them, saying the question 
was not whether they were worthy, but whether 
they were suffering." 

The amount of hostility she was compelled to en- 
counter, thus referred to by Miss C, was at one 
time very great, amounting to a determination to 
drive her from the neighbourhood. Unjust claims 
against her were purchased and put in suit, thus re- 
compensing her good with evil. Yet was she "pa- 
tient, immovable, always abounding in the work of 
the Lord, forasmuch as she knew that her labour 
was not in vain in the Lord." 

Depressed as were her spirits by the circum- 
stances in which she was placed, and dark as were 
the prospects of her own school for a time, her 
heart was at once interested for the spiritual desti- 
tution of those among whom her lot was thus cast, 
and she immediately set herself to devising methods 
for their improvement. The erection of a place of 
worship was one of her warmest wishes, and after 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 141 

years of patient, untiring, self-denying labour, she 
lived to see it accomplished, and it now stands in 
itself an object of attraction to all that pass by, but 
of far greater interest as the witness to those who 
reside near, of her anxiety for the welfare of their 
souls. Nor should it fail to produce a still wider 
influence. Certainly no circumstances could be 
conceived more disheartening than those in which 
it was planned, undertaken, and accomplished. 
With no pecuniary resources other than the results 
of her own toil, labouring without capital for the 
support of a large and necessarily expensive esta- 
blishment, conscious that there were many calls for 
her aid to those whom she loved more than her 
own self; oppressed with debt incurred from the 
highest and holiest motives, daily engaged in the 
discharge of duties, which if she had sought merely 
to pacify her conscience, might have relieved the 
most anxious, she yet shrunk not from an under- 
taking which is considered too great for many of 
exhaustless means, who rest content to be debarred 
the privileges of public worship and teaching them- 
selves, though they might be acquired without self- 
denial, and utterly regardless of the claims of pe- 
rishing souls around them. The circumstances un- 
der which this work was accomplished would 
scarcely be credited, could they be described. The 
following letter written at the time will convey a 
forcible illustration of them. It was written in all 



142 A MEMOIR 

the fulness and freeness of a long-continued and 
most intimate friendship to one of congenial feel- 
ings and closely allied to her. 

" Your letter by last mail rebuked my conscience 

so severely, my dear , that I resolved that at 

all events I would write by this mail. I confess 
that I have been so much kept in suspense by the 
state of my affairs that I have not had spirits to write, 
thinking that my letter would afford any thing but 
pleasure to my friends; but when I think of what 
my troubles are, and what those of my friends, I can- 
not justify to myself the neglect of those sources of 
mutual comfort which are always open to relations. 
I have a constant desire to hear from you all on 
my mind, and I ought to remember that you have 
the same feeling about me; but such is the weak- 
ness of human nature, that we indulge morbid en- 
grossing feelings about external things, and neglect 
the pure spiritual comforts which are ever open to 
us. I preserve a cheerfulness which seems partly 
mechanical, but it is, I trust, very much induced by 
a firm belief that God rules, and that every thing 
must work for good under His superintending pro- 
vidence. It has been a great aggravation of my 
many perplexities, that I see no chance of my ever 
again having the means of visiting friends and scenes 
so very dear to me as Elmwood and its inmates. 
For the last few years the means have been rapidly 
diminishing, while the necessity for endeavouring 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 143 

to keep up the school has never diminished in the 
least. 

"Now I am bound to a wrecked vessel on a 
desert coast, I am obliged to meet all the expenses 
of a school here, and have no income to support it. 
Ten scholars affording employment for seven teach- 
ers! what can be done? I screw and economize to 
the greatest extent; I save every thing, and buy no- 
thing, and yet I am rapidly going down, and for 
weeks have actually had just two cents, neither 
more nor less, to meet the expenses of this great 
establishment." She then refers to subjects of a 
nature too private for any eye but those for which 
they were intended by the writer, and adds: "But 
no, I am going too far, circumstances are not as bad 
as possible, though I should be like a bird escaped 
from the fowler's snare, if I were liberated without 
one dollar and without debt, .... had I any thing 
agreeable to communicate, I should make letters fly 
north, south, east, and west, and it would not be 

many hours before would have a budget; 

meanwhile may the Comforter abide with you all, 
and enable us one and all to set our hearts and affec- 
tions upon heavenly things. Ever unalterably, 
yours, "M. Mercer." 

It was but rarely she indulged thus in the expres- 
sion of her cares and sorrows even to her most in- 
timate friends and nearest connexions, and she was 



144 A MEMOIR 

wont to declare she " could not send missiles of af- 
fection barbed with poison." 

The allusion to the small number of her pupils at 
this time affords an appropriate occasion to record 
another evidence of the disinterested motives by 
which she was influenced. Thus, while she refers 
to her school as consisting of ten pupils, it is in con- 
nexion with the means of support derived from 
them. There were at the same time no fewer than 
five other young ladies receiving their whole sup- 
port, and partaking of all the benefits of her school, 
without rendering her any remuneration whatever; 
and the same disinterested benevolence was mani- 
fested during every period of her career as a teacher. 

Yet even under such circumstances of trial her 
faith did not fail her, having an anchor sure and 
steadfast fixed within the veil. Instead of murmur- 
ing and repining at the disappointment of her hopes, 
or fainting under the difficulties of the way, we find 
her thus addressing one of her former assistants, to 
whom she was strongly attached, and in whose wel- 
fare she took the deepest interest. 

..... "Indeed, my beloved friend, my sister, 
I would not, if I could, give you an adequate de- 
scription of the vexations, cares, and perplexities 
attending my removal to this place; and were it not 
that I am in the hands of the Lord, and feel that 
tribulation worketh patience, and did I not remem- 
ber that my blessed Master was perfected through 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 145 

suffering, I should have been driven to desperation 
long ago. Even now I know not what means the 
Lord will provide to relieve me from my deep dis- 
tress; but it has been at all times His pleasure and 
wisdom to bring relief for my necessities in a way 
that I knew not, and I doubt not it will be so now. 

tells me you are still unsettled in your plans: 

surely in these times of scarcity and high prices you 
will not attempt housekeeping. My dear friend, 
unless you can do better, come back to your home, 
for while I have a house, that house is your home. 
Come help me to labour in this most un- 
cultivated corner of the Lord's vineyard. I never 
saw such people. The Sabbath profaned, and no 
church in the neighbourhood." 

To her long-loved friend, Miss , she writes: 

"This instant, my dear, my early and kind friend, 
I received your valued letter, and hasten to relieve 
you of anxiety as to my health. I have been this 
winter much indisposed, and, as you may suppose, 
not in very good spirits away from home and early 
friends. And yet God, who is always good, has 
surrounded me with many blessings, and I have, as 
the spring approached, revived wonderfully. I am 
now in my usual health, and as busy as a bee, 
building up the waste places, replanting the gardens 
enclosing the grounds, tilling the fields, providing 
for my immense family in the wilderness, teaching 
natural history, botany, chemistry, drawing, rheto- 
13 



146 A MEMOIR 

ric, &c, &c, and superintending every thing. You 
may believe that I have very little time, but how 
warmly do I greet a letter from you, and how re- 
joiced shall I be to write to you, whenever I hear 
from you that you are well enough to take pleasure 
in my letters. I am working out my salvation with 
fear and trembling, my dear friend, for I have much 
to apprehend from my becoming too much absorbed 
in worldly associations. Many a snare is hid under 
a duty of high obligation; and yet I trust that you 
from your gloomy seclusion, and I from my His- 
tracting publicity of life, will meet safe in our hea- 
venly Father's mansion oirest, whence we shall be 
enabled to cast a glance of grateful retrospection 
upon the dark and thorny path by which we came 
into eternal life. "Blessed be God, who always 
giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus 
Christ." This winter has been very mild here, 
and has given me a more favourable impression of 
the climate than I before entertained. The popu- 
lation is but a grade above the children of the mist, 
but we are making an effort to instruct them by 
getting a church established. They seem quite wil- 
ling to build a small house to serve as a church and 
school-house, and I augur well from their good dis- 
position on this subject.'' 

To her friend, J. H. B. Latrobe, Esq., of Balti- 
more, she thus writes, after some years had elapsed, 
on the same subject. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 147 

" As you have never accomplished your promised 
visit to Belmont, you have no idea of the vineyard 
of our church having such a wilderness in it; and in 
turning to you to ask a favour, I only wish I could 
describe to you the moral and religious destitution 
against which a little band of poor women have 
been engaged here for now seven years. We have 
settled where has never been within six miles in 
any direction a place of public worship of any de- 
nomination, and where, of course, a population need- 
ing most emphatically our aid is most perfectly un- 
conscious of their wants. Once since I came here 
I had collected a little fund to build a church; but 
the very people who were to have benefited by our 
efforts joined to rob us of our little fund, and now 
again we have made enough to commence; and I 
have bethought me that you would contribute a 
simple but tasteful plan, the very cheapest that 
can be constructed. Will you not do us that kind- 
ness? The site is a slight elevation in a skirt of 
wood near the road." Thus it will be seen that no 
obstacle ever interposed an insuperable difficulty to 
her in the path to which duty led her. Principle 
was the incentive to action, and feeling was intro- 
duced merely as an adjunct; and while the one com- 
municated ardour to her efforts, the other guided 
those efforts with steadiness to the attainment of the 
goal proposed. Who can enter with full sympathy 
into her feelings, when, after seven years of almost 



145 A MEMOIR 

hopeless effort, the soft notes of the swelling: organ 
ibined with the richer melody of the voices of 

those who had recognised in her the instrument ho 
God's hand of new life to their souls, first hooted 
along that *'• skirt of wood." 

-A '.:.:'-y. LeiverJr -elodr. 



But whilst we thus render honour to when: hon- 
our is due. her crown was cast at the feet of Him 
who u first loved her." to who::: belong "all glory 
and honour.'*' as fro::: Hi: :es "all power." 

While she thus anxiously endeavoured to pro- 
mote the spiritual goo d of her own immec 
neighbourhood, iter enlarged benevolence extended 
its compassion to those still more destitute: 
with the deep interest we have seen she took in 
Africa, it will afford no matter of surprise to hud 
her longing for the extension of tite blessings of the 
gospel ana civilization to its degraded inhabitants. 

troduced as assistants into the school of Miss Mer- 
cer, were several of great loveliness :: character, to 
whom she became closely and tenderly attached, 
with whom she maintained a frequent inter- 
She ever regarded theii interests as identined with 
iter dwc." and followed their course wit:: svmuatuv 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 149 

and counsel. Among them was one who, after 
having been separated from her for nearly three 
years, formed a matrimonial alliance with the Rev. 
L. B. Minor, of the Protestant Episcopal church, 
and accompanied him on a mission to Cape Palmas 
in Western Africa. Miss Mercer's attachment to 
Miss Stewart had been very strong, and her interest 
in the proposed enterprise was great: uniting, as it 
did, her personal feeling of attachment to the indi- 
vidual, with her high appreciation of the duty in- 
cumbent on the Church to spread to those yet in 
darkness the light of the knowledge of the gospel. 
No sooner was she apprized of the views of Miss 
Stewart, than she wrote to her: — 

My own beloved sister in Christ: — 

All I will say is that you should commune with 
God in your own heart by prayer, and by a serious 
consideration of the duty which you are now in- 
vited to perform. Is not He who made you able 
to protect you? does He not know whereof you are 
made, and does He not consequently know how to 
preserve you under all circumstances? He says, 
" Go ye unto all the world. " Has He not been long 
preparing you by the teaching of his Holy Spirit? 
and if you yield to the dissuasions of men, will you 
be happy in the consciousness of having done so? 
1 do not wish to persuade you, my dearest friend, 
to undertake the great and solemn mission — but I 

13* 



150 A MEMOIR 

feel it to be a Christian duty to recall to your mind 
certain considerations. As for your friends, " He 
that loveth father or mother more than me, is not 
worthy of me." Suppose Mr. Minor had acted on 
the principles which are urged upon you, would it 
have been for the good or glory of the Church? 
And yet his dear old blind mother is a more sacred 
and interesting tie than any which binds you to 
home. I should love to have you always with me, 
but my imagination is already with you in your 
mountain school, where I see you, seated in the 
midst of your pupils, singing sweet hymns of praise, 
and teaching them to lisp the words of prayer. Our 
heavenly Father will surely go with you, and Christ 
will never leave you. Submission under trials is as 
important a part of Christian walk and duty as your 
rejoicing in the prosperity of the spiritual city you 
may assist to found in the very dominion of Satan. 
I have written in great haste: if it were possible, I 
would come instantly to you, but my heavy charge 
and the season both forbid, and I hardly dare hope 
that you may be able to spare two or three days, 
and fly up to Belmont, that I may see you. Say' 
every thing affectionate to Mr. Minor. You did 
not know that he is a kind of cousin of mine. I should 
like to go to Africa with you if I were young. But 
I will stay at home, and pray that God may order 
all things temporal and spiritual for your happiness. 
May you have faith, and pray believing — asking 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 151 

for none other things but such as the Spirit directs, 
and may you return at no distant time, to bring 
glad tidings of great joy to all that love the Lord 
Jesus Christ." Amen and Amen. 

Yours unalterably, 

M. Mercer. 

A few days later she adds: — " I wrote you by re- 
turn of the mail by which I received yours, from 
the impression made by it on my mind. All that 
I can now say in the moment allowed me is, that if 
I understand your situation and feelings, I believe 
it is essential to your future happiness, that you 
should prove your trust in God, and go where He 
calls you to go for His sake and the gospel's. 
Struggles of feeling you must expect to have in 
quitting home and country and friends. I would 
not persuade you to go, for it is in vain for you to 
do so if you do not go from the impulse of your 
own heart, urged on by faith and love. 

That God may bless you, and have you in His 
holy keeping, prays 

Your devotedly attached friend, 

M. Mercer. 

Three years of missionary toil returned Mrs. Mi- 
nor to her native country, a desolate, mourning 
widow. Among the first and warmest to express 
their sympathy, and welcome her to scenes of rest, 
was Miss Mercer, who thus addressed her. 



152 A MEMOIR 

"When you arrived in this country, my own be- 
loved friend, I hastened down to Baltimore to meet 
you, but found you were not there, and imperious 
duties at home forced me back, hoping that no long 
time would elapse before I should have another op- 
portunity to see you; that perhaps you would come 
to me, or that, at all events, I should be able to cor- 
respond with you. Since then, I have never known 
where you were, or how to write to you. I have 
longed, dearest, most precious friend, to listen to the 
outpourings of your cares and griefs, and to learn 
what were your future plans. I know you so well, 
that I am assured you cannot be happy in inaction, 
and yet there is much necessity for prudent and ju- 
dicious decision with regard to the choice of means 
in the service of God. I should therefore be most 
happy if you would write to me, if you cannot come 
here to see me. I would gladly come to you if I 
could leave my school, but that is now impossible. 
I think that your wounded spirit would be greatly 
restored by the spiritual rest of Belmont. It has 
pleased our God, just at this time, to visit my little 
garden, with the refreshing showers of His grace, 
and a sweeter scene could scarcely be found than in 
the band of dear young persons, all seeking the Lord 
in their youth. They are just now in the fulness 
and fervour of a. first love, and anxious to be doing 
good. Now if you would come among them, you 
might do much good for your cause. Come, then, 
my beloved Mary, and let us once more unite our 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 153 

voices in prayer and praise. How often have I 
thought, with longing desire, since you left home, 
of your sweet hymns. I never hear ' Rise, my soul/ 
but it brings you immediately before my view. I 
cannot say more unless I hear from you, but I can 
and do pray that wherever you may be, and in what- 
ever portion of the vineyard the Lord has called you 
into, He may give you sensible peace in the percep- 
tion that passive duties are as much blessed as those 
which, humanly speaking, we call more active." 

And again, she writes to her: "I do not wonder, 
my beloved friend, that you have been shattered by 
the trying duties you have had to perform, but the 
climate of your native land, the soothing society of 
your friends and family, and the bland and gentle 
influence of the Comforter, Him who loved you and 
loves you, and will love you with an everlasting 
love, are yours. There is, blessed be God, a rest 
even here for the people of God, and often I think 
of the words of the Saviour, ' While the Bridegroom 
tarried, they all slumbered and slept." The wise 
and the foolish have equal need of that relaxation 
and repose of the animal spirits which give ex- 
hausted nature time to recover its elasticity after 

sore trials 1 am grieved to find the church so 

much distracted by dissensions. Mr. Barnes and 
the Episcopal Recorder appear to me to be both 
committing sin against their common Redeemer.* 

* Referring to the controversy as to the position of the Evangelical 
body in the Episcopal Church. 



154 A MEMOIR 

Alas! alas! how often is He still wounded in the 
house of his friends. Nevertheless, His mercies are 
everlasting, as you and I, dear Mary, know by long 
experience. We are all very busy trying to get up 
a little, tiny church here in the wilderness: pray 
for us that God may bless our efforts, and the Saviour 
accept our offerings. It is truly a missionary sta- 
tion — no meeting-house of any denomination for 
twelve miles square — neighbourhood filling up — the 
habits of the people heathen — their ignorance of the 
way of salvation utter — but we have a sweet little 
sabbath-school, and I thank God that we are made 
the instruments of His mercy in this desolate por- 
tion of the vineyard; you must come and see our 
mountain home." 

We have seen that her removal to Belmont was 
under circumstances of great trial; and at a subse- 
quent period, when the commercial difficulties in 
which the country was involved had reduced her 
pupils to a very small number, her friends felt great 
apprehension lest she should sink under the anxiety 
inseparably connected with maintaining a large 
number of teachers and an expensive establishment, 
w T hile the number of her pupils was too small to af- 
ford it an adequate support. They saw too with 
painful anticipation, as the result, that these cares 
were wasting her little remaining strength. Under 
these circumstances, one of her former teachers, to 
whom she was most tenderly attached, wrote to her, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 155 

suggesting her removal to Richmond, Virginia, 
while another friend proposed Baltimore, where she 
would be surrounded by a circle of attached friends, 
some of whom thought she might there exert an in- 
fluence greater than in her present position. In re- 
ply to the former she thus wrote: 

"Your letter reached me yesterday, dear cousin 
(a term of affectionate endearment by which she ad- 
dressed those of her teachers, with whom she felt 
especial sympathy,) and I return you my sincere 
thanks for the affectionate interest you take in my 
affairs. I am doing badly enough, but I have no 
idea of Richmond. If I am forced at any time to 
quit Belmont, I hope it will be for Baltimore. I am 
too old to go to a strange place, to make new ac- 
quaintances and friends: I have neither taste nor ta- 
lents for that sort of thing. In Baltimore I should 
be surrounded by friends and near my own family: 
nothing but necessity, however, will carry me away 
from Belmont. Perceiving as I do what a blessing 
rests upon my labours in my little school, I shall not 
willingly relinquish it. I have never seen my 
school half so pleasing as during this year — no way- 
ward or refractory spirit among them, and most of 
them deeply interested in religion — I have the daily 
enjoyment of fostering and training gentle spirits 
for Heaven. Were it not for debt, I should live in 
a lower heaven here. From my heart I pity * 

* A young lady who had been a pupil, but 'took the veil ' after leaving 
her school. 



156 A MEMOIR 

I do not believe her delusions will last much longer 
than they are kept up by outward opposition. When 
she has completed all her schemes and immured her- 
self to teach French in a convent, she will besin to 
say to herself, 'this is just what I should have had 
to do had I held on to my natural friends, and in 
what do I serve God better than they do?' If she 

had been at the death bed of her aunt . she 

would have seen there what might have awakened 
her to the truth. If she had seen the beloved wife 
and mother resign her distracted husband and help- 
less children to the Saviour whom she trusted, in 
unshaken faith, and with feeble smile and failing 
voice express her willingness to depart and be with 
Christ, spending her expiring breath in healing 
the breaches of family discord, and particularly en- 
during the contradiction of sinners, — she would have 
seen that Religion, true Religion, is the worship 
of the heart: the resignation, not the abandonment 

of God's best gifts." She thus wrote to her 

friend in Baltimore. 

My dear , 

It has been long since I have written to you, but 
the purport of this letter will explain to you without 
words why it has been so. Some time since, my 

friends at West River wrote me that G had 

said if I wished to come to Baltimore and take a 
day-school, I could get a good school at once. 

§ 



Or MISS MARGARET MERCER. 157 

I then thought 1 might struggle through here, and 

every year brings with it such a precious little 
tithe offering to God from my flock, that I have 
been most reluctant to resign my charge. But it 
seems to me at present to be so manifestly my duty, 
that if I can accomplish it I will at once give up. 
I have had repeated invitations to go to Richmond, 
and there is now a very favourable opening in that 
place, but home and friends are strong attractions 
for the exile who has been so long freezing in the 
Kamskatka lam in. The desire of my heart is to 
have a small house out of the bustle, with a breath 
of air, and a few flowers out of doors, room enough 
for my family within, and a school-house discon- 
nected, with three or four class rooms. I should 
then be fixed perfectly to my mind, especially if I 
were within reach of some quiet, humble-minded, 
low-church preacher, who knew nothing among his 
people but Jesus Christ and Him crucified. To feed 
the lambs of Christ ? s flock, and lead them by the 
still and living waters of a pure faith is all the desire 
of my heart. Does it not grieve your heart, dear 

, to see ecclesiastical pride and arrogance lording 

it over God's heritage? ' I have not been well lately, 
and my spirits are languid. Pecuniary matters press 
harder and harder upon me, and when, over- 
whelmed by the waves of temporal and personal 
griefs, I fly to the ark for refuse, and think to re- 
joice in the prosperity of Zion, I look around in 
14 



15S A MEMOIR 

d — all is confusion, strife, and every evil work. 
But no more than Julian succeeded in building 
again the temple which God had cast down, e 
these aspirants to divine rights succeed in rebuild- 
ing that which the blessed Reformation cast down 
by the power of the same God. I wish you could 
be here next Sabbath. Six of my pupils expect to 
unite themselves to the company of God's faithful 
people, in the communion of Christ, our passover. 
They expected to have been confirmed, but Bishop 
Meade having been prevented coming, they ' 
unite in the sacrament I know you would 
pleased with my school. There is a gentle, serene, 
and kind spirit reigning in it which would suit vol;. 

Even has come greatly under the influenc 

it. It will be a sad day to many when I break vrp 
here, but it must be done, and if so, the soone: 

better. Write to me. dear . candidly, your 

opinion of the prospect of my succeeding in B. 
more/' 

At the instigation of Miss Mercer's nearest rela- 
tive, a maternal mai. : to whom she was much 
attached, the friend thus addressed wrote to he 
reply, urging the entire abandonment of her engage- 
ments, and expressing the desire of her aunt that 
she should spend the remainder of her days with 
her: Miss M. thus replies: 

"No ; my dear , I have no feeling but of 

warm gratitude for your kind interest in my weh 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 159 

fare, and could I take your advice and sell out here, 
I should certainly do it, but that is much easier to 
plan than to execute. One prosperous year of my 
school would make me independent, or nearly so, 
but the evil is in waiting for that. It would take a 
little volume to describe my situation to you on 
paper. Were you here, you would see a whole 
neighbourhood depending on me for support, and 
that many plans of improvement for this most de- 
solate region would be crushed by my leaving here. 
You would find a lovely family of five motherless 
children, sweetly fixed, well trained, and happy, in 
their retired country home, who would have no pro- 
tection, were I to give them up. Dear M — = — , could 
you be here one day, you would understand why I 
have struggled on, and endured the griefs and mor- 
tifications of my lot rather than move. I have al- 
ways felt it as a source of satisfaction to me that it 
pleases God to give me day by day my daily bread, 
and I have no desire for a lot in the land, but I have 
every reason to believe that my occupation is an ap- 
pointment of God, since He has so richly blessed 

my school Were I to give up my school, I 

should certainly take employment in some one else's 
school, and still devote myself to the service of God 
in the education of the children of God." 

It was amid such difficulties and labours, that the 
last few years of Miss Mercer's life were passed, 
devoted with untiring assiduity, and ever increasing 



160 A MEMOIR 

self-denial to the accomplishment of the duties of 
the mission to which she was appointed. The in- 
cidents of one day were but the type of those of the 
next, and her life passed in a ceaseless round of di- 
ligent discharge of sacred occupations. The num- 
ber of her pupils fluctuated from year to year, under 
influences which operated upon the country at large. 
In times of prosperity it was great, while commer- 
cial or agricultural difficulties were felt in the di- 
minution of her classes. 

Whilst she ever bestowed a just degree of atten- 
tion on those branches of study which are considered 
essential to the formation of the character of a cul- 
tivated and intelligent female, she still continued to 
regard the development of the Christian affections, 
and the formation of intelligent piety as the one 
point of essential importance, convinced that the 
great hold of religion is upon the affections, and 
that the appeal of the Creator in the word of God, 
" My son, give me thine heart," is made with a 
certain knowledge of the constitution of that being 
whose nature he has organized. She thought with 
Pascal — the inimitable Pascal — that " reason acts 
slowly, and with so many views upon so many 
principles which it is necessary should always be 
present, that it is perpetually dropping asleep, and 
is lost for want of having all its principles ever pre- 
sent to it. The affections do not act thus. They 
act instantaneously , and are always ready for ac- 
tion," With this view, she always aimed at the 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 161 

production of an impression on the hearts of her 
pupils, in early years; knowing that if this were 
accomplished, a door was opened through which 
light and knowledge would flow in upon the intellect 
according to the circumstances of the individual 
case. Hence it w T as her constant aim to cultivate 
the feeling of piety, of religiousness^ as it has been 
termed by a late able writer, in place of Ailing the 
understanding, merely, with abstract propositions, 
which can exert no influence except upon the head. 

But on this as on other subjects, we may permit 
her to express her own views. At a very early 
period in her career of teaching, she thus addresses 
the mother of two of her pupils: 

" I have many times since the girls returned to 

school thought, my dear Mrs. , of writing to 

you; for, although standing nearly in the relation of 
a stranger to you, I have it perhaps in my power to 
offer the sweetest consolation to your heart, in the 
assurances of esteem and approbation which I can 
so justly bestow upon your precious children. 

"I wish I could tell you, or rather I wish 1 could 
make you conscious without telling you, how dear 
to me, how undeviatingly correct, how attentive to 
their duties and observant of my wishes, how amia- 
ble to their young companions, and how deeply 
impressed with the solemn and affecting truths of 

religion they both, but especially , have been 

since the death of their beloved brother. 

14* 



162 A MEMOIR 

"Her father and yourself will, I am convinced, 
have the highest and most exquisite source of en- 
joyment open to you in the development of her 
mind and heart; she has a fine intellect, cheerful 
temper, generous and affectionate heart, and an ele- 
vation of spirit which will lead her to higher walks 
of thought and feeling, than those of the low-minded 
and sordid world who pursue their soulless course, 

° * With leaden ej-es that love the ground.' 

" Happy, thrice happy will her lot be ! For even 
could w 7 e for one moment believe that the hopes of 
religion w ? ere not to be realized in another world; 
yet, I am persuaded that the expectations of one, pos- 
sessed of genuine Christian faith, produce the most 
exquisite bliss of which the human heart is suscepti- 
ble; and the degree of purity which is the necessary 
consequence of constantly aiming at a perfect stan- 
dard of purity, opens a thousand sources of enjoy- 
ment, and closes a thousand avenues of pain to the 
heart. 

"When I think what a heavenly state life would 
be, if the modesty, charity, purity, and elevation of 
soul of the true disciple of Christ presided in every 
heart, I feel as if every energy I possessed must be- 
put into requisition, and all were too little for the 
object I have to effect, which is, to make these pre- 
cious charges of mine not only happy in the posses- 
sion of the only source of unfailing felicity, but use- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 163 

fill in communicating the same blessing to those 
who are found within the sphere of this influence." 
Amid all the trials and distresses incident to her 
condition at Belmont, she thus writes to one of her 
friends: "Soon after I came home I found a great 
seriousness growing among my scholars, and I have 
been entirely devoted to that subject for three weeks 
past. I wish I could describe the scenes I have 
had here around me. It pleased God on Sunday, 
the 2Sth of May, to send us truly a shower of bless- 
ing; no less than ten of my pupils seemed suddenly, 
and without any visible means sufficient to satisfy 
our minds, to be occupied with a sense of sin. The 
movement was not noticed on my part or that of 
any other, and yet it continued to go on, and in the 
course of the week two others came in, and certainly 
to all present appearances they are changed creatures. 

I see thus far no change for the worse. Dear , 

if you but knew how I feel while I see as it were the 
immortal soul struggling into being! I dare not 
touch the work which God is so manifestly doing 
himself. I fear to speak, and I fear not to speak, I 
am walking softly before God. I feel as though He 
had said, < Wait and thou shalt see the salvation of 
the Lord/ < Be still and know T that I am God/ Oh, 
pray with me, and for me. What is the whole world 
in comparison with one of these little ones? If you 
could but see how sweet these dear children are! I 
have not time to write to-day, but I long to hear from 



164 A MEMOIR 

you. Have you read D'x\ubigne 5 s History of the Re- 
formation? What a fascinating book it is. I have 
volumes to say about many things, but I cannot 
think of any thing, scarcely, except the blessing of 
God, which He has so mercifully sent to compensate 
me for my many troubles and perplexities. These 
are not abated, but their bitterness is taken away." 
This was written in one of the earlier years of 
her residence at Belmont, and the close of her ca- 
reer of duty was marked by an effort perfectly in 
accordance with her previous walk. The duties of 
the school were to be brought to a conclusion for 
the year, at the end of July, and on the 20th of 
June, 1846, we find her thus addressing Bishop 
Meade. 

Rt. Rev. and dear Sir,— 

I have been hoping through the year that you 
w r ould have been able to make some appointment 
to visit us at Belmont before the close of my school, 
but learning how indifferent your health was, I had 
nearly abondoned the hope, when I was informed I 
might still look for you, and immediately announced 
the intelligence to my children, who have indeed 
been hungering and thirsting for the regular preach- 
ing of the gospel. As is usual, a marked serious- 
ness has followed the year's exercises, and it wanted 
but a spark to touch the kindling spirits, and the 
flame was ready to burst forth. Dear Mr. Adie has 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 165 

by the wisdom and power of God been withdrawn 
for a season from his office, and we are about to 
disperse for the vacation, without one being added 
to the visible church, although I trust and believe 
that several have been received into the Covenant 
of grace. Mr. Andrews promised certainly to be 
with us in May, but I have not even heard from 
him. What would I not give for a few hours' visit 
from you and him during the next ten days. Sure 
I am that it would be felt on the eternal destiny of 
some souls, if you could come. My school has 
never been so well ordered, so happy, so studious, 
and so gently led on to a state of preparation as 
during this session, and I think you would be pleased 
to spend a quiet day or two with us. Say you will 
come, and you shall have undisturbed possession of 
a quiet room, and not be asked for any thing but 
your pastoral blessing. Permit me, my dear sir, 
now to express, what I have ever felt and feel more 
and more, my entire confidence and veneration, my 
gratitude, respect, and sympathy for your firm and 
faithful Christian course through life, and which I 
know and am persuaded will be unswerving till the 
full effulgence of the throne of Truth shall burst 
upon your risen soul in eternal glory. There is no 
warmer prayer drawn by the necessities of our de- 
pendent nature from the heart of your friend in 
Christ, than that it may be so." 

It could not, of course, be supposed, by any one 



166 A MEMOIR 

at all conversant with the workings of the human 
heart, and the strength of that principle of rebellion 
against God, which ever marks its actings in greater 
or less degree, when not subdued by the power of 
the Spirit, that all who were subjected to her influ- 
ence received the impression of her character. Her 
patience was often tried, and her faith*in God's pro- 
mises tested by the perverse opposition of her 
pupils to all the efforts of her love, sometimes mani- 
fested in open acts of hostility and contempt, and at 
others by a silent resistance. She was ever ready 
to meet the one with a firm and decided yet affec- 
tionate exertion of authority, and to overcome the 
ether by patient continuance in well-doing, and she 
was sometimes permitted to see the harvest gathered 
from soil the least promising, even after all hope of 
such result had passed away. Among the pupils of 
her earliest years, were two who were remarkable 
for the apparent unimpressibility of their charac- 
ters; they left her school, glorying in their freedom 
from its control. Years passed over them, with 
their chequered influences of joy and sorrow, when 
circumstances which Miss Mercer did not hesitate 
to consider special providences, led her to the places 
where they dwelt, just in time to witness in each 
the power of the principle she had so laboriously 
implanted, to retain its vitality through a long winter 
of neglect, and, in the hour of need, to spring up as 
a source of comfort to the soul: and to receive their 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 167 

thanks for the patient efforts she had made to imbue 
their minds with truth, which ultimately assumed 
dominion over their hearts, and enabled them to 
depart in the hope of a blessed immortality. 

We have thus seen that from the commencement 
to the conclusion of her career as an instructress, 
the same point had ever been before her as the ob- 
ject at which she aimed, and the blessing of God had 
rested, year after year, on her faithful efforts to pro- 
mote the good of her pupils, and His glory amongst 
men. It may not be uninteresting to turn atten- 
tion to the means employed to produce so remark- 
able a result. Among these, the most prominent 
place, certainly, is due to the influence of a holy, 
consistent example. Her daily, hourly walk was a 
constant illustration of the virtues to the practice of 
which she strove to draw her pupils. Thus, one of 
those pupils whose opportunities for observation 
have been large, both before and since she was 
brought into association with Miss Mercer, says: 
" She afforded a perfect example of all that the mere 
moralist calls good and venerable, as well as of those 

virtues which are essentially Christian." 

" The influence she possessed over the minds of her 
pupils was very great, which would certainly have 
been destroyed, had any inconsistency in her actions 
seemed to mock the power of that religion she so 
sedulously inculcated." 

Her religious instructions were communicated as 



168 A MEMOIR 

she walked by the way, when she lay down, and 

when she rose up. Nay. the very moral atmosphere 
of the institution was redolent of Christian truth. 
It was her effort to seclude herself and her charge 
as much as possible from every adverse influence. 
One of her pupils, alluding to this says: U I once 
heard her, when urged to receive newspapers into 
her school, reply, with great warmth, '"What! would 
they have me introduce the world into my little 
retreat, where my only enjoyment is found in being 
separate from all its noise and bustle?' "' Yet was 
her spirit the furthest possible removed from mo- 
roseness or asceticism. In her renunciation of the 
world, she never felt disposed to crush the joyous 
feelings of youth, or damp the ardour of that spirit 
of affection by which we are bound to our fellow- 
men. She looked abroad on all the beauties and 
bounties of Creation, and within, at the adaptation 
of man, (the crowning work of the whole grand 
united scheme,) to find pleasure in the position in 
which he has been placed by Him whose wisdom is 
especially exhibited in the wonderful adaptation of 
all the complex works of His hand to the circum- 
stances by which they are surrounded, and she strove 
rather to develope the capacity for enjoyment, than 
to curtail it in its actings. Her views of the vanity 
and emptiness of many of the pursuits by which 
man perverts his powers, and frustrates his own de- 
signs, were, as we have seen, very decided. But 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 169 

she ever endeavoured to send forth her pupils, 
armed against the allurements of false pleasures, by 
the knowledge of a more excellent way to a more 
certain and present joy. As one of her pupils re- 
marks, " Those w T hose circumstances cast them into 
general society, she armed against its dangers, not 
with superstitious terrors, but with ' the whole ar- 
mour of God/ teaching them that when the heart is 
right before God, outward circumstances, whatever 
they may be, only afford channels through which 
Christian feeling may be manifested as well in trifles 
as in greater things." 

But she did not rely simply on a general impres- 
sion on the heart. She was fully aware of the im- 
portance of an accurate knowledge of the word of 
God, and a correct comprehension of its teachings; 
and laboured most assiduously to convey this know- 
ledge to the understanding of her pupils. For this 
purpose she prepared a volume of" Studies for Bible 
classes," with the view, as she remarks in the pre- 
face to it, "of training the young to search the 
Scriptures of Truth for the evidence of those things 
which they have been taught by the Church," in 
order that they may "know the certainty of the 
things which belong to their eternal life." 

The lessons were systematically arranged, com- 
mencing with the existence of God, passing through 
the attributes of the Deity, the divinity and huma- 
nity of Christ, and the existence and offices of the 
15 



170 A MEMOIR 

Spirit,— to the relations existing between the triune 
God and his creatures, and embracing the various 
duties from man to God and his fellow, growing out 
of those relations. A text on each subject was fur- 
nished as a key note, and the pupils, provided with 
a reference Bible and Concordance, were required 
to " search out correlative texts, examine, compare, 
and transcribe them." When these were submitted 
to her, she made them the occasion for questions, 
by which to elicit the extent of their knowledge, 
and the character of their impressions on the sub- 
ject of the lesson; and entered into such explanations 
and exhortations as were appropriate, taking care 
that they should not be misled by mere literal con- 
nexion. The manner in which she discharged this 
duty was impressive in the highest degree. Her 
long-tried, faithful, and sympathizing friend and 
fellow-worker, Miss Condy, thus speaks of her 
mode of communicating religious instruction: 

" It would be almost impossible to give to any 
but a member of dear Miss Mercer's family circle 
an idea of her value to her household generally, 
and of the importance of her instructions to those 
placed particularly under her charge. It was in the 
familiarity of social converse, after the labours of 
the school, in the hours of recreation, when all, 
teachers and scholars, sought her society, that some 
of her most valuable lessons were given, and ren- 
dered so attractive by her peculiarly affectionate, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 171 

though always impressive manner, that but few 
failed to listen to and profit by her most casual re- 
marks. But never did she appear so interesting to 
us as when engaged in the duties of the Sabbath. 
Her health for some time was too delicate to admit 
of her rising at the early hour appointed for the en- 
tering upon our week-day duties; but she never 
failed, if tolerably well, to be with us on Sunday 
morning. She would read to us an interesting por- 
tion of scripture, generally from the Psalms, and 
then point our attention to some striking passage, 
in such an earnest and solemn manner, that the most 
thoughtless could not escape reflection. Her Bible 
class was remarkably interesting, — her little book 
will give some idea how it was conducted. The 
clergymen who have occasionally visited Belmont 
have been edified and much pleased with this mode 
of instructing her pupils in the essential doctrines 
of the church. Never did her mind seem so free 
from all worldly care and anxiety, her countenance 
appear so bright and cheerful, or her intellect so ac- 
tive, as on the Sabbath, which she devoted exclu- 
sively to spiritual concerns and duties. I have 
known her to be so exhausted when the hour for 
retirement came, by her efforts for the good of her 
pupils on that day, as to remain for some time to 
all appearance lifeless. This shows what extreme 
delicacy of constitution she had to contend with 
through all her arduous labours. 



172 A MEMOIR 

"We miss our dear Miss Mercer every hour in 

the day; our thoughts and hearts are ever dwelling 
upon the recollection of all she was to us — of all we 
hare lost with her. But on the Sabbath, how we 
long for her blessed presence! 'Rest, rest/ have I 
often heard her beg for, and can we wish her back 
in this unquiet world? 

" She often repeated, and admired much, one of 
Charles Wesley's hymns, in a little collection called 
'Village Hymns. 5 One verse I often heard her 
repeat: — 

' This languishing head is at rest, 
Its thinking and aching are o'er, 
This quiet, immovable breast 
Is heav'd by affliction no more.' " 

The following letter is among the latest expres- 
sions of her feeling addressed to a very intimate 
friend. 

Belmont, August 31 st. 1546. 

"I long for rest of mind and body, and sincerely 
wish I could be with you again, but next week my 
labours open upon me; I must use all my energies. 
Sincerely do I pray that God would raise up some 
one to take my place, and let me enter into my rest. 

u I have been severely tried by the sudden and 

rapid progress of dear 's illness; it came on me 

like a thunder-clap, but God's will be done. The 
attack on my lungs last winter has had an effect 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 173 

upon my arms and hands that prevents my writing 
much. 

"Indeed, dear M., I feel a very sensible failure 
from year to year. I look forward with intense 
desire for the rest that is our blessed heritage. Ever 
the same, and entirely yours. M. Mercer. " 

Miss Coxe, of Cincinnati, having addressed a let- 
ter to Miss Mercer, inquiring as to her method of 
communicating religious instruction, Miss Mercer 
replies: 

Dear Madam, — 

I have just returned home after an absence of 
some weeks, as this is my vacation, and urged by 
the consciousness that my abilities to do good are 
far on their wane, I hasten to show my willingness 
to strengthen the hands of one who I trust is des- 
tined to much usefulness. 

That God has often visited my school with an 
outpouring of his Holy Spirit, and that many, many 
dear pupils have been added to the true church 
from it, I most thankfully acknowledge; but by 
what means the divine work has been accomplished 
I cannot pretend to say. My own view of the sub- 
ject is, that by patient and prayerful waiting upon 
the use of the Scriptures, searching them faithfully^ 
as the source of truth, and watching to make the 
appointed use of every varying providence that each 

15* 



174 A MEMOIR 

hour brings forth, I have been taught to look to 
Christ, and to Him alone myself, and thus being 
taught, I have been enabled to teach others. 

Added to this deep impression of knowing no- 
thing among men but Jesus Christ, and Him cruci- 
fied, I have adopted more system than is generally- 
used in teaching religion, and as system is, I believe, 
always more perfect as it is more simple, I have 
attempted scarcely any thing but to train them to 
" search the scriptures" for themselves, by a method 
which I will presently explain. 

To comply as well as possible with your request, 
I have taken the liberty of transmitting to you my 
first and only effort at authorship. The "Ethics," 
you will readily see, have no other aim but to draw 
the attention of my pupils to the truth, that morality 
is the law of God, and to be found pure only in the 
Bible. The arrangement of the little volume of 
Bible studies you will understand. Our Sabbath 
occupations are light; we keep late hours on that 
holy day, and I willingly admit the plea of servants 
and children that it is a day of rest for those who 
have laboured during the week. This I concede, 
because I find it very difficult to command the at- 
tention, and regulate the animal spirits of children 
during a long day. Before breakfast the girls re- 
cite verses and hymns; after breakfast we study the 
Bible lesson, which comes in regular succession ac- 
cording to the direction of the manual. We have 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 175 

always a Sabbath-School, in which the teachers and 
some of the young ladies engage as instructors. We 
have either morning or evening service, as we are 
favoured with public worship or not. When we 
have no minister, we read the evening service and 
a sermon, devoting the morning to Bible studies, 
reading, teaching, and good books. In the evening, 
before prayers, we recite the Bible lesson, in which, 
as each young person reads in regular succession 
the texts searched out, I make such remarks as I 
think expedient; for instance, if I find a text irrele- 
vant, I take the opportunity of making use of it to 
instruct incidentally upon some other point. Thus, 
I say, I think you have mistaken the import of your 
text; it relates to such a subject, and means so and 
so; and by the by, we teachers all know how often 
this indirect instruction, coming as suggestion, 
makes much more impression than if direct. If a 
text is read, which gives me the opportunity to do 
so, I seize it, to urge more strongly upon them a 
doctrine which they do not appreciate, or a duty 
which they have neglected. Some of our lessons 
are continued from Sabbath to Sabbath; that on the 
divinity of our Lord occupies us six Sabbaths, and 
I have never been more thankful for a privilege 
than for that of having so studied it for their sakes. 
I never doubted the divinity of our Lord, but I had 
no idea of the mass of evidence in the Old Testa- 
ment, nor of the force of His appeal, " They are 



176 A MEMOIR 

they that testify of me," After our Bible lesson, 
the day is closed by evening prayer, in which I 
have been always in the habit of reading a chapter 
and selecting some important texts, generally bear- 
ing upon the subject of the Bible lesson, which I 
enforce by the strongest comments I can make. We 
always sing in family prayers. 

Thus you see, dear madam, there is nothing new 
in the means God uses with us, except the studying 
separate subjects in our Bible lessons; and this I 
adopted because I have often heard very good per- 
sons maintain such very unscriptural opinions, appa- 
rently because they had not made the Bible its 
own expositor, on such points, and compared all 
correlative texts. If you do me the honour to read 
my little volume of Ethics, will you kindly read to 
the end before you criticise, and then return and 
review such parts as do not meet your approbation, 
and express fully and freely your views to me, as I 
may ere long revise it for republication. 

I had once the pleasure of riding from church 
with Bishop MTlvaine.* I shall never forget it, and 
if he will accept them, pray present my most re- 
spectful regards to him. The blessing of God is 
upon his labours, and will be so. I shall be happy 
again to be refreshed by your zeal in the first of all 
causes — Christian education, 

And remain, dear madam, yours truly, 

M. Mercer. 

* Miss Coxe is a near connexion of the Bishop of Ohio. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 177 

The volume of Ethics to which Miss Mercer here 
alludes, is one of the most important results of her 
labour. It is in the form of lectures to young ladies, 
which she employed as a text-book in her instruc- 
tions in moral philosophy. It is admirably adapted 
to its purpose, conveying in chaste, yet glowing 
language the feelings of a sanctified heart. She 
adopts the word of God as the only source of 
knowledge, as well of the practical duties of life, 
as of our relations to the Author of our being, and 
endeavours to explain and enforce the principles 
there laid down for the formation of character, and 
the government of life. It is a work well worthy 
of the diligent study of every woman who desires 
to attain to a high degree of moral worth. 

She thus opens her instructions. 

My very dear young friends: 

Bright and glorious is the morn of life, when 
youth and inexperience launch their light bark upon 
the sparkling tide of a new existence. Their broad 
pennon bears, in its silken folds, hope on the wing 
pursuing distant pleasures; their bright streamers 
flutter in the stirring breeze, revealing curious de- 
vices of anticipated joys; the spray casts around the 
vessel's prow showers of diamonds; the dipping oars 
send back, on the circling waves, patines of bur- 
nished silver, and flashes of living gold; and softly, 
as the receding waters close behind the stern, they 



178 A MEMOIR 

murmur a gentle, kind adieu. Life is then all 
poetry — all pleasure; and well do the aged remem- 
ber the magic power of youthful feelings and ima- 
ginations, and what a dazzling glow their own en- 
thusiasm spread over the sober realities of life. But 
far from the promised haven for which they sailed 
is the shore where their broken voyage has ended. 
Many and sorrowful have been the shipwrecks 
which they have witnessed: gay hearts swept away 
before the receding tide of fate: confident spirits 
sunk in the raging deep, or dashed on the rocky 
coast of disappointment and despair. To one who 
thus looks back upon the sad vicissitudes of a past 
life, there is something deeply affecting in the un- 
conscious mirth of the young, sporting heedlessly 
on the verge of an ocean of trouble, upon which 
they are but too willing to embark, without rudder 
and without compass. 

To furnish you. before you commence your voy- 
age, with the means of descrying approaching dan- 
ger, and of protecting yourselves from the fate of 
the inconsiderate and the ignorant, is my present 
aim. To dangers you must be exposed. May you. 
from the experience of others, learn in time so to 
direct your course as to exalt you to honour and 
usefulness, to the favour of God and of man: to the 
portion of happiness which is destined for the good 
here, and to that perfect bliss which is reserved for 
the virtuous hereafter. Let me prevail with you to 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 179 

lay aside the levity natural to your time of life, and 
allow me to command your attention, your deep 
and serious attention, while I endeavour to explain 
to you the principles of that science which has for 
its object the happiness and the perfection of the hu- 
man soul: for moral philosophy may be defined the 
science of human happiness and virtue. The term 
moral, strictly speaking, signifies what belongs to 
conduct. Philosophy (more than mere science) 
means the love of knowledge. The beautiful sig- 
nificance' of the term moral philosophy, then, should 
not be lost sight of. It means the love of that prac- 
tical wisdom, which, if pursued aright, and with 
ardour, leads to every thing that is noble and virtu- 
ous, lovely, and of good report: and aids in preparing 
the soul for heaven, by saving it below from the 
contagion of folly and vice. 

Since our object is always to lead the mind up to 
God, and to promote gratitude and devotion to him, 
we will now pause and survey the wonderful palace, 
with its vaulted roof, where the mind sits supreme, 
and listens to the wonders reported by his alert and 
skilful ministers, the senses. What is there that the 
human mind cannot compass by their aid? No cu- 
rious object of rare and beautiful in the mineral, ve- 
getable or animal kingdom, from the elephant to 
the mite, can escape the scrutiny of the naturalist. 
Does he not see another world existing around us? 
The most transparent atmosphere, the crystal foun- 



180 A MEMOIR 

tain, the petals of a little flower, are they not to him 
redolent of life in all its exquisite variety of ani- 
mated being? How he hangs over the delicate 
mimosa, and wonders to see it shrink from his deli- 
cate touch, as if modesty informed it. From the 
palms and banyans of the tropics, to the firs and 
mosses of the arctic regions, he cons, and compares, 
and describes, and names them all. All — from the 
adamantine centre round which our earth concen- 
trates, to the orient pearl brought from the ocean 
depths, to the gold and gems from the mountain 
heights — all fills his wondering soul with rapturous 
praise. But chiefly the infinite beauty of insects, 
shell-fish, flowers, and, above all, birds excite his 
soul to indescribable emotions of delight. If God 
had given me but sight, and offered me no other 
object of vision but the little ruby-breasted hum- 
ming-bird, hanging, as I have often seen him, over 
the pensile flowers of the graceful scarlet fuchsia, 
lifting them one by one to insert his long bill in 
quest of his delicate food, I could not contemplate 
this single evidence of the wisdom, power and good- 
ness of the Deity, without being raised, refined and 
purified. But the little gem of animated nature 
glances athwart my view, like the coloured spec- 
trum of the solar beams cast by the moving prism; 
and I have but time to realize that he is a living 
creature, with flesh, and bones, and skin, a heart and 
lungs, a beautiful arched head with senses like my 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 181 

own — when borne on his fine, light, flexible wings 
to a far height above the earth to which I cling, his 
keen eye penetrates the distance to where fresh 
flowers are blooming, and there, as odorous vapours 
circle round his head, he darts from cup to cup, and 
sips the honeyed stores, and hastens on to seek new 
pleasures. Would you know how these delightful 
images are communicated to the mind. Examine, 
then, the eye. First, see how the precious instru- 
ment of vision is folded to rest at night; even the 
sun himself withdraws his light for a season, that 
the wearied sight of men, and beasts, and birds may 
rest, and be refreshed. Folded in its fringed cur- 
tains, it lies unconscious of the world around, until 
stimulated by the returning light, the windows are 
once more opened, and day pours in, bringing with 
it all that the endless variety of symmetrical forms 
and harmonious colours of nature can offer to en- 
chant the mind. But how is all the immense space 
before us, the great concave of the heavens, with all 
its glories, and the wide-spreading earth, with 
oceans, rivers, mountains, valleys, plains and cities, 
brought distinctly within the compass of the visual 
orb ? By simple laws, my dear children, with which 
it belongs to another department of your education 
to make you acquainted. I will only say here, that 
certain lenses receive the rays of light which come 
from every point of all the various objects of sight 
before you, and refraction concentrates them, so as 
16 



1S2 A MEMOIR 

to bring them to a focus on the retina, which is the 
interior surface of a dark chamber, prepared to ex- 
clude all light, except that which enters through 
the lenses to which is committed the office of ar- 
ranging the objects of vision in their perfect order. 
Thus far we have an apparatus for sight. The ca- 
mera obscura in our library is made in imitation of 
it, to receive and reflect the images of external ob- 
jects; but here we must stop in our investigation of 
the theory of vision. How these pictures on the 
retina are conveyed to the mind, and preserved in 
the memory, we know not. The impressions made 
by them on the mind have been called ideas; but, 
lately, the hypothesis to which this term belongs 
has been rejected. For myself, I have much reve- 
rence for it: and I do believe that the images formed 
on the retina may, by a similar process, be again re- 
flected and contracted to smarter and smaller spectra, 
until reduced, like the elementary particles of mat- 
ter, to such dimensions that there may be whole 
galleries of painting in the palace of memory, land- 
scapes, buildings, portraits, historical pictures; what- 
ever the mind's eye hath seen worth treasuring up. 
And from such a process we might find the solution 
of the enigma of objects being inverted on the re- 
tina, and yet never so seen. But you have much 
to study upon the subject of the senses. The ear 
is quite as curious as the eye, being constructed to 
communicate sounds; the interior structure resem- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 183 

bling musical instruments, and the whole being co- 
vered with a thin membrane, through which the 
vibrations of the atmosphere, produced by different 
sounds, come in contact with the nerves of the ear, 
and convey a corresponding impression to the mind. 
Immediately connected with, and dependent upon 
the sense of hearing, is the power of speech, the 
noblest faculty of man. In vain would the flexible 
tubes of the throat have been attached to the elastic 
chest of the lungs; " the ready, swift and tuneful 
tongue " would have been mute for ever, had the 
ear not received and aided the mind in the arrange- 
ment of articulate sounds into language. Smelling 
and taste are conveyed in the same way, by the 
nerves of their peculiar organs. But the wonderful 
office of the senses is in conveying abstract thought 
from one mind to another — even from one genera- 
tion to another: so that, by a glance of t}ie eye, or 
an inclination of the ear, we are able to hold high 
converse with the ancient world, to know the 
thoughts of our first parents, and enter into their 
feelings; to pity the exiles from Eden; to admire 
the wisdom of Moses, or the prophetic inspiration 
of Elijah, or Isaiah; time, space, the very confusion 
of tongues, all yield to the magic power of the 
senses; but one who does not use the senses as the 
media through which knowledge is conveyed to the 
mind, but derives the highest enjoyments from the 
mere impression of external things upon the senses 



184 A MEMOIR 

themselves, is unworthy the possession of such 
blessings. The gratification of the eye, in the ob- 
jects of beauty with which he surrounds himself; 
the gratification of the ear/m the excessive cultiva- 
tion of music; the gratification of the taste, in Epi- 
curean viands; the gratification of smelling, in lux- 
urious and costly perfumes; and of touch, in the 
velvets, satins, fine furs, &c, with which he sur- 
rounds his body, makes man a sensualist. These 
indulgences are generally palliated, by applying to 
them the term taste; but a refined taste implies in- 
tellectual enjoyment, derived through the senses, 
rather than from them. This taste is a faculty of 
the mind) and exercises itself in moral and intellec- 
tual operations upon subjects made known to it, 
through the agency of the senses. Taste, for in- 
stance, is delighted with the abstract quality of fit- 
ness , or the suitability of things for the purposes 
for which they were created; and while the eye be- 
holds the light in the heavenly bodies, and feels the 
beauty of their different glories, taste follows philo- 
sophy into her deepest cells; when shut in from the 
visible heavens, she traces their distances and velo- 
cities, and dwells upon the wisdom, goodness and 
power which measured their orbits, balanced their 
respective weights, gave them forms to correspond 
with their distances, and satellites and circles of lu- 
minous air, to supply their deficiency of light from 
solar beams. A sensualist is in the lowest grade of 



OF MISS 3IARGARET MERCER. 185 

humanity. He may improve the discriminating 
power of all the senses, but he is still merely a re- 
fined brute; while the man of pure good taste rests 
not in their delight, but receives from the pleasure 
they afford a mental impetus, which carries him far, 
far above the earth; even where Thomson soared, 
when he caught the eternal song of saints around the 
throne, and poured forth his hymn of praise, 

"These are thy glorious works, Parent of good!" 



LECTURE XVIII. 

HONOURING GOD BY OUR LIVES AND CONVERSATIONS. 

Whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God.— 1 Cor., x., 31. 

To honour God and to glorify God are synony- 
mous terms; and nothing has been more unjustly 
condemned than the use of such expressions. Men 
say plausibly, how can the creature add any thing 
to the Creator? how can a worm of the dust give 
glory to the God of heaven and earth ? Certainly 
we can add nothing to the intrinsic character, or 
actual possessions of the Lord of all; but the expres- 
sion conveys, and means to convey, a very different 
idea, It means that by using voluntarily, as we are 
enabled to do, the power of the Deity to become in 
our own persons clear manifestations of that glory of 

16* 



186 A MEMOIR 

God which is displayed in the perfection of his crea- 
tures, we shall produce a moral influence upon all 
around us, which will lead to a general adoption of 
principles and conduct such as will increase the per- 
fection and happiness of his creatures. The perfec- 
tion and happiness of God's creatures is his greatest 
glory: therefore, whatever adds to the perfection 
and happiness of his creatures, adds to his glory, or 
the manifestation of his glorious attributes to the 
created world. 

If God is revealed to us in a glorious light as the 
Creator of the world, certainly there is nothing 
w T hich contributes more to that glory than the crea- 
tion of the human soul w T ith all its wonderful facul- 
ties: and to bring these faculties to maturity, and to 
exhibit man in that state of perfection of which his 
nature is susceptible, is certainly to augment the dis- 
play of his Maker's glory. Every individual in- 
stance of superior moral elevation of character and 
conduct is calculated to produce a pious emulation, 
as well as a higher and stronger perception of the 
glorious intentions of the Creator with regard to us. 
It is an evidence that he, indeed, intended us to be 
examples of that glory of his in creation, which is 
manifested in all his works, but in nothing so much 
as in a good ma?i, a good woman,) or a good child. 
As I believe, according to the doctrine just advanced, 
that examples are the means appointed by the Crea- 
tor for the extension of his glory, as it is written. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 187 

"Let men see your good works, that they may glo- 
rify your Father in heaven," I will, at present, en- 
deavour to set before you such instances from real 
life, and so recent, as to be fair examples of what 
each one of us may be if we will. John Howard, 
deservedly called the "philanthropist/' may serve 
as the instance of a man who lived to the glory of 
God; Elizabeth Fry shall be our good woman, and 
for a good child, since I cannot cite any who have 
been so conspicuous as to add much by their active 
virtues to the glory of their Maker, I shall content 
myself in showing you in what way it is possible 
even for "babes and sucklings to perfect praise." 
How beautiful to our eyes is the delicate rose-bud, 
when it first bursts the folding leaves that have con- 
cealed it from our sight, and shows its little fringed 
cone of tender green. It is not to compare in grace 
of form, in beauty of colour, in rich and delicate 
odor, to the perfect rose; but, after a long winter, 
the sight of the first spring bud brings with it more 
dtlight to our senses than a wilderness of summer 
roses. Because the promise is so sweet and refresh- 
ing, and we anticipate all that is lovely from that 
which we see. So, the earlier in life children give 
indication of their virtuous dispositions, their 
anxiety to prove their love of God by some active, 
persevering effort to do good, the more we look for- 
ward to their glorifying God hereafter in their lives 
and conversations, Nor is there a sight upon earth 



188 A MEMOIR 

more calculated to excite the reverence of man for 
the great power of God, than to witness that do- 
minion of his grace in a young heart, of which we 
sometimes see such remarkable instances. 

Cornelia M , the daughter of my neighbour, 

and my god-child, was a lovely, gentle, innocent, 
intelligent, sprightly, but diligent child. Although 
playful, she was singularly given to serious medi- 
tation from her earliest childhood. At seven years 
of age she was teacher in the Sunday-school, and so 
anxious to instruct the little slaves, in her father's 
house, to read the Scriptures, that she would weep 
for their averseness to learning; "for how," she said, 
"would they ever know their duty to God, if they 
would not learn to read the Bible." Soon after she 
attained her eighth year, this dear child was taken 
with an inflammation of the throat, which, after a 
very short period of extreme agony, terminated in 
her death. During her illness, the admiration of all 
around her was excited by her patience, her con- 
sideration for others, her prayers for her friends, 
and for all mankind, and, finally, by the triumph 
of her faith in God in the trying hour of death. "I 
am in a great agony," she said; "I am going very 
fast; I hope I may live to see my dear mother and 
sisters," who were from home, but every hour ex- 
pected to return. "I want to see them, and then I 
want to die, and go to heaven." "Mammy," she 
said, with infantine simplicity, to her weeping nurse 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 189 

"don't cry for me; God is going to take me to 
heaven to be his own dear little child" Nor was 
there self-complacency in this assurance of faith; 
for, being in extreme agony, she exclaimed, u 0h. 
God ! have mercy upon me, a poor sinful child." 
Her father replied, " God loves you, my dear; you 
are not sinful, but a good, obedient little child." 
"Oh! no, father," she replied, u God knows lam 
a sinner; /am not good." So that it was faith in 
God's mercy through Christ which strengthened her 
to desire to go "through the valley and shadow of 
death, fearing no evil." Blessed child ! sweet, early 
blossom of paradise! how art thou since expanded 
into celestial glory, planted for ever by the rivers 
of life ! May our deaths be like yours, gentle, sweet, 
full of love, and hope and peace in believing. None 
could doubt that she realized the nature of death; 
for shortly before she had seen her little sister, a 
pale corpse, laid in her coffin, and committed to the 
earth. No martyrs ever proved more clearly their 
trust in the promises of God. Sweet, happy cherub ! 
since your triumphant spirit winged its rejoicing 
flight to the kingdom of eternal glory, the con- 
queror of nations, the envy and admiration of ephe- 
meral man, the great Napoleon, has fretted out the 
peevish remnant of his proud career, "like a bea- 
con on the breast of the ocean;" and if his conqueror 
still walks the earth, who, that thinks of the frailty 
of human greatness, but must anticipate the proba- 



190 A MEMOIR 

ble difference between the death of Wellington and 
that of the beautiful child pluming her dove-like 
wings for her heavenward flight, conscious of being 
beloved by the Glory of all the nations, the Con- 
queror of sin and death. 

In the history of ancient nations we are led to in- 
quire what became of that miserable portion of hu- 
man society who, from sickness, from vice, or from 
any of the various ills that flesh is heir to, were re- 
duced to destitution among them — that class which 
fills our alms-houses and hospitals. We hear in 
every history, sacred and profane, of a prison to in- 
carcerate the body of the unfortunate debtor, to chain 
the miserable criminal in dungeons, when his liberty 
or life had been forfeited to the laws of his country, 
or to the despotism of man; and to confine, in heavy 
fetters, the captive monarch, or the rival chief; but 
where are there any vestiges in their antiquities, of 
the asylums for widows and orphans, for the blind, 
the deaf and dumb; where their houses of refuge for 
the reformation and education of vagrant youth, 
their alms-houses — " where age and want sit smiling 
at the gate." Whence is it, that there seems to 
have been no provision for suffering poverty; but 
the candidate for heaven, the poor, good man, " laid 
by the road-side, and the dogs licked his sores." 
Whence the wonderful change which we now be- 
hold; for while we no longer see some ghastly, dust- 
covered mummy enshrined in a magnificent mau- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 191 

soleum, sufficient for a living king and his retinue 
to dwell in, our lands are adorned with beautiful, 
bright edifices, on every front of which Christian 
charity seems to be emblazoned in words of living 
fire. It is the love of God shed abroad in our hearts 
which has thus changed our public institutions, sub- 
stituting the active principle of serving the living, 
for burying the dead; expending the resources of 
society in the promotion of human happiness and 
virtue, instead of exhausting the lives and treasures 
of nations, in splendid temples for the absurd and 
disgusting worship of some profligate woman, a 
Venus, a Juno, or a Diana, the records of whose in- 
famous lives should be banished from our schools. 
The same spirit which has wrought such a change 
in the objects to which the wealth of man is devoted, 
has changed the direction of heroic minds, and the 
philanthropist is now considered as a greater man 
than the conqueror. Since Jesus has introduced a 
new criterion of human perfection, thousands on 
thousands have felt that, if the believer in Mars 
naturally offered the blood of slaughtered ene- 
mies to his God, as an acceptable gift, the believer 
in Jesus Christ must offer the sacrifice of every sel- 
fish principle of his own nature, and load the shrine 
of his God with works of love and mercy, to the 
just and to the unjust. Such a worshipper of the 
true God was John Howard ! He was truly a 
Christian hero in spirit. Awed by no dangers, 



192 A MEMOIR 

checked by no difficulties, repre no failures, 

he was never wear}' in well doing. And having 
opened his generous heart to the enlarged views :: 
Christian charity, his compassion was equ; 
touched with the iron that entered into the soul of 
the prisoner in Turkey, in Egypt, in Russia, or in 
England. Wherever there was a man, that : 
was a brother of his soul ; and that brother's gro: s, 
in his loathsome dungeon, fell upon Howard's heart, 
as he sat by his own cheerful fire-side, surrounde 
every social comfort; and he arose and went forth 
on his pilgrimage, with Christ to live, to labour, and 
to die, for those who loved him not, who knew him 
net. No dazzling display of scenes to captivate the 
imagination gratified the latent vanity of the bui 
heart, no pulling down of Bastiles, and sasting out 
of the wretched inmates of monastic seclusion, ex- 
cited his pride by popular applause. No : while he 
passed slowly through the cells of criminals, or of 
the miserable victims of human selfishness, he sub- 
stituted a bed for the damp ground, or unchanged 
straw; he obtained fresh clothing for the lojag-for- 
gotten tenant of some fetid cell ; or he procured : ne 
cheering ray of Heaven's blessed light to shed a 
smile upon the darkness of despair, within the dun- 
geon's gloom. And if these angelic visits p 
ever registered for fame, it was by angels at the 
throne of Jesus, who never cease rejoicing i:. 
holy labours of his saints on earth. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 193 

Some years since the attention of the English na- 
tion, first awakened by John Howard, was forcibly 
called to the state of prison discipline in England, 
and a bill was reported by Mr. Brougham to parlia- 
ment on the subject. To prove the possibility and 
the necessity for such a reform, he cited the then 
recent effect produced by the labours of a single be- 
nevolent individual, and that a delicate, and not 
very wealthy woman. Elizabeth Fry, a member 
of the Christian society called Friends, being in 
her youth one of those who are denominated gay 
Friends, after passing a winter in London in much 
company, became deeply sensible of the awful re- 
sponsibility of spending time, talents, and every 
other means of usefulness, in selfish amusements. 
She therefore determined at once to dedicate her- 
self wholly to God, in the elevated pleasures of a 
pious life. She soon formed a plan to attempt the 
reform of the prisoners in Newgate; but her hus- 
band and family thought it so enthusiastic a scheme, 
that it was some time before she obtained their con- 
sent. Then, when she applied to the public autho- 
rities, they again opposed her wishes, represented 
to her the horrid ferocity and desperate depravity 
of the wretched inmates of the prison. Only stimu- 
lated to perseverance by their descriptions, she urged 
her petitions, until at last she obtained permission 
to make the experiment, and, accompanied by the 
keeper, entered the common room of the female 
17 



194 A MEMOIR 

prisoners, who immediately crowded around her 
with vulgar curiosity. She inquired, with gentle 
benevolence, if their situation was not very com- 
fortless and miserable. They replied that it was. 
She asked them if they would not rejoice to have a 
friend come among them, to assist them to do some- 
thing to improve their condition. With the hard- 
ened recklessness of the desperately vicious, they 
laughed, and replied : " A friend ! who cares for 
us, or would spend their time in befriending us? 
We have no friend." "Yes," said she, "you have 
a Friend, and he has sent me here to persuade you 
to aid me in plans which I have for your benefit." 
Then she opened the Bible which she had brought 
with her, and read from Isaiah the following words: 
" The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he 
hath sent me to preach the gospel to the poor: he 
hath sent me to heal the broken-hearted, to preach 
deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight 
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised." 
These touching words she explained in tones so ex- 
pressive of deep feeling, that her horrid audience 
were actually melted into tears, while she told them 
of Jesus, their Friend, the Friend of prisoners and 
captives; and that he had sent her to try to do them 
good; and she besought their assistance to effect 
her good wishes. They willingly consented, and en- 
tered into her plans. She made her arrangements 
with the aid of a committee of young ladies, to teach 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 195 

them to sew and read; for, as ignorance is the pa- 
rent of vice, she found that most of them could do 
neither. Imagination cannot realize, probably, the 
scene described by a young lady of the committee, 
who undertook to open a school for these miserable 
wretches, in a small room which had been appro- 
priated for the purpose. She said, that when they 
crowded in tumultously, fighting for places, and 
cursing and scrambling over the benches which had 
been arranged for their reception, she could only 
liken the scene to the lower regions, and felt an in- 
describable horror in finding herself shut up alone 
with them. The scene, however, was soon entirely 
changed. Order, cleanliness and sobriety pervaded 
the prison ; and Mrs. Fry was daily greeted with 
the most perfect reverence and affection. On en- 
tering, instead of the various exhibitions of drink- 
ing, gambling, quarreling, &c, which usually pre- 
vail in the public room of a great prison, all the pri- 
soners were to be found in groups, listening to the 
Bible, or some good book, while they employed 
their hands in a variety of work which had been 
provided for them by their kind protectress. After 
a while, however, suddenly there appeared to be a 
great falling away; they went back to their bad ha- 
bits, neglected their work, sold their materials for 
drink, and Mrs. Fry appeared to be defeated in all 
her efforts to reclaim them. She, however, con- 
tinued her unremitting labours, every day address- 



196 A MEMOIR 

ing them, and always proposing some plan for their 
improvement and comfort. One day, ahout a fort- 
night after the change, a woman came to her, and, 
bursting into tears, drew a pack of soiled cards from 
her pocket, threw herself on her knees before her, 
and begged her forgiveness; saying, that she knew, 
unless she obtained it, God never would forgive 
her. She stated, that when she was brought into 
the prison, and saw what was going on, she had 
been seized with the most determined hatred to 
Mrs. Fry and her plans; and had resolved to thwart 
and oppose her in every thing. That for this purpose 
she had introduced cards, and drawn away the pri- 
soners to every sort of dissipation. But she could 
hold out no longer against Mrs. Fry; and she pro- 
mised, if forgiven, she would never offend again. 
To this promise she was faithful; and, after effecting 
the greatest change there, Mrs. Fry went through- 
out England, Scotland and Ireland, establishing si- 
milar regulations under the direction of prison com- 
mittees. It is now nearly twenty years since the 
subject was brought before parliament; and this 
Christian woman is still, I trust, walking her rounds 
of duty, with the untiring zeal of one who draws 
her spirit from the everlasting God. These are, 
then, the examples which I promised you, of per- 
sons in the ordinary walks of life, honouring God 
with their lives; and, as they honoured him by 
their deeds of benevolence, so their conversation 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 197 

was always such as becomes godliness. If you are 
conscious that the sin of idle talking prevails among 
you 5 if you are sensible of so offending individually ; 
or, if the sad effect of this low, disgraceful, and cor- 
rupting vice disturbs the peace and serenity of your 
little circle, let me entreat you, as the most certain 
corrective of the evil, to form some common plan 
for promoting the perfection and happiness of your 
fellow creatures. Imbue your hearts with the spirit 
of active charity, and the gossip of the worldly- 
minded will indeed sound on your ears like idle 
words. No conversation will then appear to you 
worthy of notice, but such as has some evident 
bearing upon the improvement or happiness of the 
human race. When this has once become the main 
object of your hopes, your fears, your labours, and 
your prayers, it will become the most interesting 
subject of your thoughts, and the favourite theme of 
your conversations. Imagine Mr. Howard, or Mrs. 
Fry, to return home at evening, with souls filled 
with images of the poor prisoners they had visited, 
hand-cuffed and chained, lying on a pile of filthy 
straw, perishing with cold and hunger, or, worse, 
in the horrid bondage of sin, blaspheming, drinking 
and fighting in their superterrene hole. Do you 
think they would be agreeably amused, if, when 
their efforts were directed to " stir up the pure 
minds fervently " of the young around them, to aid 
in their noble labours, they were called upon to join 

17* 



A M£MOIB 

in the c\v.'.:..':^ prattle oi girls iiscussing the riba 
do theii j oi lgs ; n Lheii hooter- ; ;r. i i 

the equally con ten;:: u. : o of yc 

fashion. of their hat-rims. or : r shoe-ties. 

or, still worse, the erael, wicked custom, usual with 
both sexes, of dissecting :. sr: -eaki :*. ^ 

evil of others, merely to excite some interest in 
?i sation ? C 
fiOia ■ is ' : ' t. A sc ahy 

rersation shelters and cherishes the new-:: 
spirit oi vi rtoe. as the Bower ores the fruit,: 
the : til] atmosphere of a heartiest] world; and 

the beauty oi holiness expanding in conversation] 
gives ration:! anticipation : rinci- 

ples ripening into the richest fruits oi ;:::: works. 
Yoj know the tree as well by the flower as tite 

t. and never need you hope to see the fig follow 
the thistle flower, or grapes the wild choen: :: the 
thorn tree. Honour God. then, with your bodies 
and spirits, in your lives and conversations, show 
forth holiness out of a zocz conversation: for ,; :e 
king's daughter is all glorious within. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 199 

LECTURE XIX. 

THE FEAR AND LOVE OF GOD. 

The fear of the Lord is to hate evil, pride, and arrogancy. — Pro v.. 
viii., 13. 

If we measure civilized man. as a species, with 
Christ, and consider his words, "If ye are as I am 
in this world, ye shall be with me in the world to 
come/' we cannot but be astounded, and say, "Who 
then can be saved ?" At long intervals, however, 
some men have arisen as witnesses for God, to show 
that the law is holy, just, and honourable. That it 
is made by the Omniscient, who knows what powers 
he has conferred upon his creatures, and conse- 
quently what he has a right to require. Such was 
Howard, such were Swartz, Oberlin, Felix Xeff, 
Marty n j and many others: a sufficient number to 
prove that God requires nothing more than the best 
use to be made of the powers he bestows. We have 
then to ask, with increased anxiety, why, if God 
has given both the command and the power to obey 
it, men are living so without God in the world? 
Because we have most of us parted with the freedom 
of conscience which we all have by nature; '•' we 
have sold ourselves for naught, " "we are sold under 
bondage to sin,'* ;i and no man hath wherewith to 
redeem his soul," or " ransom his brother." We 



200 A MEMOIR 

have accustomed ourselves to disregarding and vio- 
lating the commands of God, until we have con- 
tracted a contemptuous disbelief of them; and now 
we follow our natural propensities, which are in all 
flesh "earthly, sensual, devilish." And how, I 
pray you, were the men we have named, or was 
ever any other man brought to illustrate the sublime 
principle of holiness by his life and conversation ? 
Never, but by cultivating a just timidity as to his 
own performances, and so high a sense of the perfect 
requirements of God's law, as creates a wholesome 
fear of coming short of them. Under this state of 
mind, holiness becomes an object of intense desire ; 
we see its transcendent beauty, we love it, and, 
consequently, we fear never to obtain it. We dis- 
cover that God is its only source, and we begin to 
apprehend what the law means by the command, 
"Be ye holy, for I am holy;" "Be ye perfect as 
your Father in heaven is perfect." Be ye perfect 
sons, as your Father is a perfect Father; perform 
your relative duties to him, and to each other, as he 
performs his relative duties to you. Set your whole 
heart, and mind, and strength to the study of his 
will, that, in the spirit of obedience, you may say, 
as Christ did, " Lo ! I come do thy will, 0, God !" 
The fear of God enjoined upon his people is not the 
fear which a slave has of a cruel master, but the 
fear that a noble-minded, affectionate son has of 
doing anything to distress his father; and whoever 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 201 

has not this fear, has not true love for his parent; 
neither can any man love God without having it in 
a very high degree. To obtain it, we must often 
and deeply consider the certainty that the God who 
fashioned and made us, within and without, certainly 
knows, at all times, the most secret thoughts of our 
hearts. We should always feel as if he were visibly 
present; as if the eye of one whom we love and 
fear, and to whom we are responsible, was fixed 
upon us; that he would reward, love us, and bless 
our labours, just in proportion as our thoughts and 
intentions were according to his holy will and com- 
mandments: and that, on the other hand, we should 
make ourselves odious to his holiness, if we followed 
the lower propensities of our animal nature. Imi- 
tate then, ye that wish for glory, honour, and im- 
mortality, the custom of the Lord Jesus Christ, who 
always met every exigency with Scripture, and 
carry about with you as a talisman, this wholesome 
command: "Sanctify the Lord of hosts in yonr 
heart, and let him be your fear, and let him be 
your dread. " Cultivate such an apprehension of his 
great sanctity, as may fill your hearts with an awe 
and fear of being seen, and examined thoroughly, 
by such a perfect Being; of being called into his 
presence to answer for all your follies and impu- 
rities; and to account to him for never having used 
the means which had been so effectual in preserving 
others from the pollution of sin, and in elevating 



202 A MEMOIR 

them to such eminence in virtue. Solomon says, 
"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom \" 
and St. John says, "Perfect love casteth out fear." 
Let us then cultivate a wise fear of falling short in the 
love and obedience which we owe to the Lord our 
God; nor be too forward to dismiss the principle upon 
any apprehension that our love will satisfy his perfec- 
tion; for, in his great love for us, he would have us 
to shine forth in his own divine image. It is a fact, 
easily explained, that those who have proved the 
highest love of God, have also had the strongest ap- 
prehensions of falling short of salvation. The reason 
is, simply, because they retain a very high sensibility 
of conscience, from not hardening themselves by 
sin; and by purity of mind, they obtain such views 
of the holiness of God as cast their best works into 
so strong a light as to expose their imperfections 
and corruption to view, and to deprive them of all 
the eclat which they might derive from comparison 
with the works of men. The last words John 
Howard ever penned, were these: 

" I think I never look into myself, but I find 
some corruption and sin in my heart. Oh, God ! 
do thou sanctify and cleanse the thoughts of my de- 
praved heart. Oh! that the Son of God may not 
have died for me in vain." 

But this was in the consideration of himself, for 
he had perfect confidence in the merits and media- 
tion of Christy and left it to be inscribed on his 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 203 

tomb: * In Christ is my hope." The day he died, 
he told Admiral Priestman, "Priestman, you style 
this a dull conversation, and endeavour to divert 
my mind from dwelling upon death; but I enter- 
tain very different sentiments. Death has no ter- 
rors for me; it is an event I always look forward 
to with cheerfulness, if not with pleasure; and, be 
assured, the subject is more grateful to me than any 
other." But how shall the man who has such a 
sense of duty as to adopt the following maxim, fail 
to tremble before the all-seeing God ? 

"Our superfluities," says Mr. Howard, a should 
be given up for the conveniences of others; our 
conveniences should give place to the necessities of 
others; and even our necessities give way to the 
extremities of the poor." Looking at ourselves, 
we may well be all fear; looking to God in 
Christ, we have nothing to fear; but that we 
may fail so to divest ourselves of a worldly spi- 
rit, as to be entirely surrendered to his will and 
pleasure. It is a safe method to dwell much upon 
the love God, and his great and manifold mer- 
cies, so that we may be encouraged by a strong 
hope. At the same time it is a wholesome appre- 
hension, and one that makes us careful, often to 
look into our own sins and imperfections, until 
we are conscious that there is much reason to fear 
that we are too sinful, and too little sensible of the 
great goodness of Christ to-be permitted to plead 



204 A MEMOIR 

a claim through him as a Saviour. Fear is the fruit 
of self-knowledge, and self-knowledge is a divine 
science, learned by studying with meekness and 
perseverance, under the teaching of God's word, the 
daily course of our own performances of duty. 

Nor let soft slumber close your eyes, 
Before you've recollected thrice, 
The train of actions through the day: 
Where have my feet chose out their way ? 
What have I learn'd, where'er I've been, 
From all I've heard, from all I've seen? 
What know I more, that's worth the knowing? 
What have 1 done that's worth the doing? 
What have I sought that I should shun? 
W 7 hat duty have I left undone ? 
Or into what new follies run ? 
These self- inquiries are the road 
That leads to virtue and to God. 

Now no one can faithfully perform this duty 
without seeing how much they fall short of their 
obligations every day: consequently, they must fear 
that when they are weighed in God's balance, they 
will be found wanting. But, at the same time, 
when most impressed by a sense of our demerits, 
we most clearly perceive the infinity of that good- 
ness and mercy which have followed us in spite of 
our unworthiness, all the days of our lives; and we 
are conscious, that if ever we are lost, or fall short 
of glory, honour, and immortality, it is because we 
will not obey the command to come to the Saviour, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 205 

and let him purify us, and make us fit for the pre- 
sence of God. 

Thus/ear checks presumption, and hope nourishes 
faith, and stimulat.es to active efforts to please God; 
and the two principles work together for the per- 
fection of the human soul. 



LECTURE XX. 

PRAYER. 

Men ought always to pray, and not to faint.— L use, xviiL 1. 

Mr dear young friends: 

That men should pray is not contained as a com- 
mand in the Decalogue, nor in any other law of 
Moses. This may surprise you, unless you consider 
well what prayer is. It is the natural expression of 
religious affections, and consequently cannot be com- 
manded to those who have none, and need not be 
to those who have. It is as needless to command 
men to pray, as to command them to ask for food or 
drink when they are hungry or thirsty. If prayer is 
merely an expression of the soul's sincere desire, why 
urge a man to ask for what he wants, when you have 
placed a Being before him, as the object to whom his 
prayers may be freely addressed, and from whom 
he may be certain of meeting with perfect sympathy 
and the full accomplishment of his wishes, If 
IS 



206 A MEMOIR 

prayer, then, is a mere voluntary expression of our 
thoughts and feelings, prayer is a privilege, and not 
justly the ground of positive enactment. To de- 
spise and neglect such a privilege must necessarily 
be punished by a loss of all the blessings which are 
contingent upon the use of that privilege. The be- 
nevolence, then, of the Deity is expressed in afford- 
ing man a code of moral instructions, by which he 
is made sensible of his moral wants, and the source 
whence he may obtain their supply; and the simple 
suggestion, that "men ought always to pray/' is 
freely and frequently given in Scripture. Instead, 
then, of enjoining upon you to pray, I would pre- 
sent to you first for consideration, the duty of a 
preparation for prayer, which consists in a high 
sense of the great dignity and holiness of the Being 
who is to be addressed ; the full perception that 
he has purposely made you dependent upon himself, 
and that there is no other way by which you can 
obtain the supply of your wants ; and lastly, that 
your real wants be fully discriminated in your own 
mind, from those false and spurious desires which 
originate in the base animal propensities. If "you 
ask amiss/' you will not receive. Neither can you 
suppose that the great and holy God will be pleased 
to find you neglecting the good of your immortal 
soul, and its grand and glorious destiny, for the sake 
of that perishable house of clay, in which the spiri- 
tual tenant is lodged for a few brief days. Stimulate, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 207 

then, your desires for those things which will con- 
duce to your true good, by forcing your thoughts 
continually to dwell upon them, as you increase 
your animal wants by contemplating their attrac- 
tions: and "be not hasty to utter any thing before 
God." When a man urgently desires any thing, he 
will be ready to express his wants, even to those 
who cannot gratify them; and how much more so 
to those whom he knows to be only waiting for the 
expression of his wishes to fulfil them. No skepti- 
cism could prevent him from asking from One who 
alone knew, and had power to relieve his necessities, 
that which his soul longed to obtain. 

Consider, then, this wonderful state of being, with 
all its infinite series of co-operating contrivances, 
the work of one God; the same God who brought 
you into existence, and gifted you with the means 
of seeing him in his works. Consider, that he who 
planted the ear must hear; he that revealed himself 
to us as the omnipotent Creator, and made us con- 
scious that much is wanting to the perfection of our 
happiness, intended thereby to lead us to apply to 
Him to perfect that which he had begun. We can- 
not doubt that such was the intention of the Creator, 
since such is the effect of that nature which he has 
given us, and those providences by which he has 
surrounded us. 

I apprehend that a most serious injury has been 
done to mankind by too frequently presenting 



20$ 



A MEMOIR 



prayer to them as a duty, rather than as a privilege; 
by inculcating the idea that it is a something to be 
done, from a sense of duty, as a good work, whereas 
prayer is simply the natural expression of our 
wants and wishes; and unless we are conscious of 
wants and wishes, we cannot pray. Instead, then, 
of recommending to men to pray, I would urge upon 
them to put themselves in a condition to pray; to 
qualify themselves to do so, by meditation upon 
their condition before God. How much they want, 
tha he alone can give them! It is only by a 
knowledge of his being and attributes that they can 
know how to address themselves to him. And it 
is by a strong perception of his great wisdom, power, 
and goodness, that they are led to form a desire, 
which is certainly excited, that it may be gratified. 
It is a movement of the soul which he meads them 
to follow, just as hunger' is intended to lead us to 
seek nourishment for our bodies. And, moreover, 
this proves his approbation of their following this 
natural disposition to lay their wants and wishes 
before him, by making it the means of increasing 
their happiness and virtue, even when his wisdom 
de lies their requests. " I would, then, that all men 
should pray*' is the language of nature, as well as of 
revelation: and, in fact., savages praying to their 
idols of wood and stone} are t he con vinei ng evidence 
of this: for the soul so much inclines to address its 
wants to some superior power, that it prays, even 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 209 

to the works of its own hands, from the foolish 
ignorance of the natural mind being persuaded that 
Deity will delight to dwell in what is so much the 
object of its own admiration. If, then, all men do 
not pray to our holy God, it is because they feel no 
want of those things which they might ask of him; 
what they feel they want, they pray for. The proud 
man prays to the God of his own imagination, that 
his enemies may be humbled 5 the Christian prays 
to his God, that his sins may be forgiven. The 
sensual seek pleasure in the groves of Cytherea ; 
the pure in heart see God as he is, and pray for his 
Holy Spirit to elevate their thoughts and feelings, 
and make themselves more like himself; nor is it 
difficult to perceive what prayers will ascend as 
grateful incense to the throne of the high and holy 
One who inhabits eternity. Never, then, offer to 
God a form of prayer, without having first realized 
the substance of it in your heart, whether it be 
supplication or praise. God, in various ways, ar- 
ranges his providences so as to excite in our minds 
a sense of gratitude, ana\ thus we are as naturally 
led to thanksgiving as we are led to supplication, 
by the pressure of our wants, and their subsequent 
gratification. Thus he works in us to will of his 
good pleasure, and to come before him with praise 
and thanksgiving, as he, by the recurrence of hun- 
ger, makes us grateful for food, and by the weariness 

IS* 



21G A MEMOIR 

of the body, makes us thankful for rest. God has 
ordained whatever is the unavoidable effect of his 
providences. Adam saw, in his solitude, amid the 
joyous uproar of birds and beasts disporting each 
with their kind, that it was not good for man to be 
alone. It was through the voice of nature that God 
said it to him. And when the perception of his 
loneliness had become painful, then the wisely with- 
held blessing became a lively type to him of the 
parental care of his Creator, and he said, " God saw 
that it was not good for man to be alone." It is 
the spiritual communion with God in the sanctuary 
which brings our spirits to a perfect conformity 
with his Spirit. Consider then maturely, my dear 
young friends, what your real wants are, and speak 
nothing rashly or irreverently before your Maker, 
"who giveth to ail life, and breath, and all things." 
And be assured that, if in his wisdom he sees that 
the granting your prayer will conduce to your true 
good, he will grant it; if not, he will in its stead be- 
stow what in the end you will find to be much better. 
" Use no vain repetitions" in addressing him "who 
knows, before you ask, what things are necessary for 
you;" but will have you feel and think much of your 
spiritual, as well as your temporal wants, of your de- 
pendence upon him; and lay them all before him 
with reverence, and humble submission, in a perfect 
assurance that he " is a Hearer of prayer, and a Re- 
warder of those who diligently seek him," 



0F MISS MARGARET MERCER. 211 

If a preparation of the heart is necessary for 
prayer, we can no where obtain such aid in making 
this preparation, as in a deep and careful study of 
the Holy Scriptures; and a consideration of our 
troubles and necessities should lead us to use such 
means as it has pleased him. to whom we are to 
pray, to afford, of acquiring a knowledge of what 
will be acceptable to him in prayer. Let us then 
see what is said in holy writ on the duty of 
prayer. 

Private prayer is enjoined there, in these words: 
" Enter into your closet, and pray to your Father 
in secret, and your Father which seeth in secret 
shall reward you openly. " 

Social prayer is also thus inculcated: "Where 
two or three are agreed together to ask any thing 
in my name, I will grant it." 

Public prayer is also thus indirectly commanded: 
" It is written that my house shall be called the 
house *of prayer" God, then, having appointed 
the temple as the peculiar place of prayer, our Sa- 
viour banished all worldly concerns from it, that 
the command of his Father might be fulfilled, and 
the house once more be dedicated to prayer. In 
conformity to this, the Christians, at the same time 
that they were instructed not to confide in the office 
of high priest, which was at an end, since the bring- 
ing in of better things by the blood of Christ, were 



212 A MEMOIR 

told "not to neglect assembling themselves to- 
gether;" and Peter and John went up into the 
temple at the hour of prayer. When the veil of 
the temple was rent in twain, it was that the glory 
might fill the whole house. In the New Testament, 
then, which is our peculiar institute of practical law, 
we have a dedicated temple, an assembling of the 
people, an appointed hour of prayer, which the 
apostles obeyed as scriptural precedent, (for direct 
law to pray, we have observed, there is none, al- 
though many regulations, as to the time, frequency- 
manner, matter, place, and, above all, the spirit of 
our prayers.) And now the only point to be ex- 
amined is, did each one pray for himself, or were 
they led by one voice ? St. Paul speaks of the gift 
of prayer, and not praying in an unknown tongue 
to the people; and since they were promised a bless- 
ing when two or three asked the same thing, doubt- 
less they who were of one mind and one spirit, 
when they came together, united their votces in 
making their common request to the universal Fa- 
ther ; but they were led by the appointed minister. 
We should use, then, private prayer for our indi- 
vidual wants; social prayer for social purposes; and 
public prayer, to make known to the Lord of the 
whole earth our national wants. We should also 
use prayer as the appointed means of binding so- 
ciety together in the ties of Christian fellowship. 
Those who habitually partake together of the pri- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 213 

vileges of the sanctuary cannot, if they worship in 
spirit and truth, fail to love each other, and to be 
deeply concerned for those things for which they 
united in prayer. 

The earliest annals of history speak of acts of de- 
votion performed by good and bad. We find, how- 
ever, that such men as Moses, David, and Daniel, 
prayed constantly and fervently; and when men 
have given the evidence of wisdom which Moses 
gave, and of genius and eloquence such as David 
possessed, they may be permitted, if they are so 
disposed, to convince others of the inutility of 
prayer. When Jesus was asked by his disciples to 
teach them to pray, he gave them a formula, which, 
for conciseness and comprehensiveness, has been the 
admiration of those who have examined it, for more 
than eighteen centuries. An analysis of it affords 
us the amplest view of our relations to God, to our- 
selves, and to our fellow creatures, and yet it is so 
simple that an infant can be taught to comprehend 
it. 

Bishop Wilson has mentioned as the chief use 
of prayer, that it changes (not God's counsels, but) 
us, making us more worthy subjects of his grace 
and mercy. Nothing can be more calculated to 
produce such an effect, than an examination of the 
high and holy import of those few simple words of 
the Lord's prayer. In the first words, " Our Fa- 
ther which art in heaven," we are taught to ad- 



214 A MEMOIR 

dress the Deity by a term which must excite the 
highest sense of dependence, gratitude, and reve- 
rence for him, as a Father. Secondly, they teach 
us not to view him as our own Father alone, but 
the words, "our Father," remind us that, as he is 
the common Parent of men, all men are brethren; 
and so, by a sense of our duty to him, we are for- 
cibly reminded of our duty to each other. Thirdly, 
the state of heaven is here introduced to remind us 
that there is a state of being where our common 
Parent is; and to which we should all strive to be 
admitted, as to a home. Fourthly, we are taught 
to pray, " Hallowed be thy name," that is, that all 
men may have a due understanding and reverence 
for the holy name of our heavenly Father: that they 
may comprehend in it all his great and glorious at- 
tributes; and, in making this petition, we must con- 
sider well whether the honesty of our words is 
proved by our efforts to produce this happy state of 
the world. Fifthly, u Thy kingdom come" is the 
natural sequent of the foregoing clause. For if 
men would but seriously consider all that is implied 
by hallowing his name, that is, not to speak of it 
without due apprehensions of his wisdom, power, 
and goodness, they must come so thoroughly under 
his dominion, as that God's kingdom should come, 
or be established among men. And, sixthly, men 
knowing his divine perfection, and seeing the 
" beauty of holiness," would never be satisfied until 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 215 

that state was brought about, in which God's " will 
should be done on earth as it is in heaven" 
Blessed state of peace and love ! If it reign for a 
little time, in one heart, it is a foretaste of heaven ; 
in one family, it would be a miniature heaven on 
earth. If it were fulfilled in all the nations of the 
earth, it would be earth turned into heaven; it 
would be the millennial reign of Christ. But although 
this state of things is the constant object of our la- 
bours, and the incessant subject of our prayers, yet 
have we to wait patiently for its fulfilment. So far, 
in the spirit of universal benevolence, we are taught 
to pray for common blessings upon the whole hu- 
man race. But now we are permitted to make our 
personal requests known, and how much is included 
(seventhly) in the few words, " Give us this day 
our daily bread. " Old and young, rich and poor, 
from ihe monarch to the peasant, each one is de- 
pendent upon the providence of God for bread; for 
the sustenance of their being, both bodily and spi- 
ritual. And as we cannot take a sufficient portion 
of nourishment to-day, to enable us to dispense with 
a similar portion for to-morrow and the next day, 
and again the next, so we are bound to feel that our 
dependence upon God is from instant to instant ; 
and what we want every day, we should ask for 
every day. Eighthly, what a volume of virtue and 
happiness might be extracted from this form of sup- 
plication, " Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive 



216 A MEMOIR 

those who trespass against us." As -we measure 
unto others, shall it be measured unto us again. 
Oh, heavenly Father! fill then our hearts with thy 
perfect love, that we, showering the blessings of 
Christ's glorious gospel upon the whole benighted 
world around us, thou mayst pour out upon us 
the precious things of thy divine love. Let us not 
rest in mere passive forgiveness; let us love and do 
good to our worst enemies, that thou mayst love us 
for our resemblance to thee. Ninthly, what could 
follow more suitably the consideration of the duty 
of mercy and forgiveness, than that we should pray, 
" Lead us not," or " suffer us not to be led into 
temptation." Let no prosperity tempt us to forget 
ourselves, nor adversity harden our hearts, so as to 
weaken our trust and confidence in thee, our God ; 
nor dry up the sources of our Christian charity and 
sympathy with our fellow creatures; but, tenthly, 
" Deliver us from evil." Let thy omnipotence con- 
trol, not only outward events for our safety and 
happiness, but enter into our sinful minds, oh, hea- 
venly Father! and leave us not to our depraved na- 
ture, but govern us in all things, by thy grace; so 
shall we be enabled to live as subjects of thy king- 
dom, and power, and glory. 

Prayer, or the worship of God, is divided into 
three parts, confession, supplication, and thanks- 
giving or praise. Each one of them is equally ob- 
ligatory with the others. It is our duty to confess 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 217 

our sins to God in secret, then it is our duty to ac- 
knowledge our sins before men, as an example to 
them that they may confess their sins. So of sup- 
plication, it is our duty to pray both in private and 
in public, for those things which we are commanded 
to ask of God, that others may be induced to do so 
too. If thanksgivings are proper for one, they are 
so for all men ; and we should let men see us per- 
form our duties to God, that they also may glorify 
our Father in heaven. 



LECTURE XXL 

SERVING GOD WITH THE LIFE AND SUBSTANCE. — TO DEVOTE 
MYSELF, MY LIFE, AND ALL THAT I CALL MINE, TO HIS 
SERVICE. 

Every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, 
or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall re- 
ceive a hundred fold, and shall inherit eternal life.— Matt, xix., 29. 

What have we that we have not received of 
God? Have we independent existence, or is there 
any other possession of which we may say, it is mine, 
I made it? Wealth? The earth is the Lord's, and 
the fulness thereof. Power ? There is no power 
but of God, and thou couldst have none, unless it 
were given to thee from above. Talents? He who 
made thee and fashioned thee, within and without, 
19 



218 A MEMOIR 

committed these to thy keeping. Time? Behold, 
yet a little while, and thou shalt not be, and thy 
place shall know thee no more. But when thy 
mortal life has gone out, and all thy earthly pursuits 
and pleasures have passed away and are forgotten, 
then shalt thou hear, in thy grave, the herald of the 
eternal I AM, "who was, and is, and is to come" 
calling thee back to existence; and thou shalt stand 
before him and answer to these awful questions. 
Where is the interest of those talents which I com- 
mitted to thee upon earth? I gave thee an im- 
provable faculty, I bestowed upon thee a spark of 
my own divine fire, and intended and commanded 
thee to kindle a great flame with that little spark. 
I intended thee to become a burning and shining 
light, to glorify me among men, and thou wouldst 
not. 

Look back eighteen hundred years ago, and be- 
hold, in a province of the Roman empire, by the 
sea-side, a young man, dressed in the garb of a pea- 
sant, walks there alone! He sees two fishermen dry- 
ing their nets, and he calls to them, (and afterwards 
at different times to ten other obscure men,) and 
commands or persuades them to follow him. What 
is he? Where are they to follow him ? What induce- 
ments does he offer them? What are their united 
efforts to effect ? He was, we are told, a carpenter's 
son; he had lived heretofore with his parents, in the 
obscurity of the most despised district of the pro- 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 219 

vince. It does not appear that he clearly communi- 
cated to his companions why they were to follow 
him; and the influence by which he induced them 
to do so, can only be explained by the unique cha- 
racter which is ascribed to his presence, his power, 
his wisdom and his goodness, in which they felt the 
presence of divinity. Never man acted like this 
man, might have been said with the same truth 
which forced his appalled adversaries to confess that 
" never man spake like this man." He came, as he 
declared, to set up a kingdom which should pervade 
the whole earth; and yet his kingdom was not of 
this world. He was the Prince of peace, and yet 
he came not to bring peace upon earth, but a sword. 
He came to reign, but he came to die an ignominious 
death. He promised his disciples thrones and king- 
doms; and yet he warned them, that they should be 
scourged and tormented, and put to death for his 
name's sake; and yet not a hair of their heads should 
perish. They followed him, because they saw in 
him a tone of authority which they had never seen 
in the most highly gifted men ; and they thought he 
was, (strange and paradoxical as it might seem,) the 
Christ, the Messiah ; the long hoped for Prince, who 
was to restore Israel. The object to be effected by 
their united efforts, is to be collected from various 
relations which they have left in writing. It ap- 
pears from these, that the first work they entered 
upon was teaching; and when they had succeeded 



220 A MEMOIR 

in collecting a sufficient audience, his first public dis- 
course is recorded. From it we are led to perceive 
that his object was to make the poor contented with 
their destiny, and to inculcate peace and good will 
among men, and especially to promise with autho- 
ritative decision the highest rewards and enjoy- 
ments of heaven to the meek, the pure in heart, 
and the peace-makers. Having spent several years 
in great poverty, inculcating an unresisting submis- 
sion to personal injuries, and even forbidding his 
followers to defend his life when violently assailed, 
we hear that he was at last crucified publicly, and it 
would seem intentionally; for the history so states 
that he previously instructed his followers it " must 
needs be. " But why " must it needs be ?" Because 
he meant those who should hereafter believe in his 
name to see that they must not value their lives in 
comparison with the object of promoting his king- 
dom upon earth. He meant to leave to his follow- 
ers a command to " go unto all nations, baptizing 
every creature, teaching them all such things as 
they should do," in spite of every resistance and 
persecution which the wrath of man could devise. 
They were to persevere against kings and princes, 
and magistrates, scourges and tortures, and violent 
deaths, in doing his mandate ; and he meant, after a 
life of superhuman wisdom, goodness and power, to 
die, and to rise again from the dead, to convince 
them that it was their duty to devote themselves, 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 221 

all that they were, and all that they had, to the ob- 
jects to which he had directed their attention. They 
so understood it, and, putting away from them all 
worldly-mindedness, they entered zealously upon 
their duty, and wherever they made converts, those 
converts thought themselves bound to enter upon 
the same course of life, and to give themselves, and 
all that they possessed, to the promotion of their 
Master's cause. And now, do you ask me, where 
was the injunction taken off? I profess to you I 
could never see why or when it was supposed to be 
remitted. I know not why we are not individually 
bound at this moment, if we are enjoying all the 
blessed influences of Christian institutions, and all 
its precious hopes, to do as much in the service of 
its Founder, as were the first disciples. That we 
were expected to continue the w T ork of evangelizing 
the whole -worlds I conclude from the expression, 
"Lo! I am with you always, even unto the end of 
the world." Now it is unaccountable, that Chris- 
tians should have ceased to go unto all nations, and 
should have persuaded themselves that they were 
living under some new dispensation, in which they 
were exempted from the duty of labouring to effect 
the purpose for which the Saviour and the apostles 
shed their blood; and I believe that w T hoever will 
take up the New Testament, and study it with an 
anxious desire to ascertain his whole duty, that he 
may leave no part undone, will be convinced that 

19* 



222 A MEMOIR 

it is as much our duty now to propagate true reli- 
gion among all the nations, as it was that of St. Paul 
or St. Peter. He will be convinced that God will 
require at our hands that we should have dispensed 
to the ignorant all the light which we possess; and 
that our money, time, influence, and every other 
means, should be devoted, without reserve, to pro- 
mote the cause of truth. That, laying aside all 
worldly, sensual, selfish objects, we should dedicate 
ourselves to such studies and pursuits as may most 
effectually prepare us for usefulness. He will feel 
that we should joyfully consecrate ourselves, our 
lives, and all that we call ours, to the extension of 
his kingdom upon earth. This I am sure of, be- 
cause the command is, " teach every creature;" 
and, consequently, until every creature has been 
taught, the command has not been fulfilled; and, 
since the apostles, by the permission of Heaven, have 
departed and left the work unfinished, it devolves 
upan their followers to complete their work. I am 
the more assured of this, because, first, men are as 
mortal now as formerly ; secondly, they are as much 
sinners; thirdly, their souls are as valuable; and if 
our Lord shed his own blood for sinners, then surely 
the souls of sinners are as precious, and as worthy 
of the devotion of our lives now, as of his then; 
fourthly, if the life of the Lord Jesus Christ was 
given as a ransom for souls, certainly we should not 
value ourselves, our friends, our fortune, talents, or 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 223 

any other gift of God, so highly as to say we are 
not to relinquish it for the purpose for which his 
life was given up. Neither can we say that the 
great object was effected by his sacrifice, and there- 
fore on?* sacrifice is not required; for it is to be ob- 
served, that the effect of his sacrifice was limited in 
the first instance to saving those who were his dis- 
ciples ; and it was by their dedication of themselves, 
and their self-sacrifice, that the world was to be con- 
verted. It was when Christians began to live at 
ease, and relinquish that entire dedication of them- 
selves, and all their possessions, that the progress of 
Christianity declined ; and now that men have ceased 
to think it their duty to go unto all nations so soon 
as they unite themselves to the church of God, they 
will harcHy cast of their abundance into the treasury 
enough to keep some few poor missionaries from 
perishing, and the progress of our blessed faith has 
nearly ceased. When savage nations are ready to 
receive Christ with open arms, and nothing is wanted 
but teachers, we find that faith has so declined in 
the church, that one generation after another of the 
heathen world perishes in darkness, and none are 
going forth with the glad tidings of the Gospel. If 
some, more zealous than the rest, leave home and 
friends for the kingdom of God's sake, deeming the 
eternal felicity of their fellow creatures of more 
worth than a few hours, days, or years of domestic 
ease and temporal enjoyment to themselves and their 



224 A MEMOIR 

families, even Christians often, instead of cheering 
them on their career of sacred self-dedication, and 
rejoicing that Christ has found a faithful advocate 
and a minister, chill, with their icy judgments, the 
very heart's blood of the apostolic follower of his 
crucified Lord. 

It will be remembered that, from the commence- 
ment, I have held up Jesus Christ as the standard of 
moral performances, as I suppose his Gospel to be 
the measure of moral principles. I will therefore 
now forego the appeal that may perhaps be termed 
a reference to religious feelings, and request you to 
examine the precept, which I consider as the basis 
of all moral obligation, "Men should do unto others 
as they would wish others to do unto them." You 
are in the enjoyment of peace and security; equal 
rights and privileges are yours, as members of a civi- 
lized community; your government is based upon 
the principles of a just equality; and your institu- 
tions for learning, your public charities, and the 
meliorated tone of morals, manners, and customs of 
your country, excite your triumph, and you very 
truly consider your national blessings as incompara- 
bly greater than those of a vast portion of the nations 
of the earth. If Providence, then, has so highly 
favoured your country, should you not extend the 
blessings of civilization and Christianity to your 
fellow-men? Should you not endeavour to com- 
municate to them those arts of happiness, those 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 225 

morals, manners and customs which have rendered 
your country so prosperous? Reverse the condi- 
tion of things, and consider well, if you were in the 
savage ignorance and corruption of the heathen na- 
tions, do you think it would be desirable that be- 
nevolent men should leave happy homes like your 
present, and go to your assistance, and instruct you 
in all that ennobles, elevates, and refines a people, 
and makes them happy? If you cannot but confess 
that you see it would be most desirable, in your own 
case, to obtain such aid from men, then consider it 
is an indisputable principle, left to your honest ap- 
plication, to "do unto all men as you would wish 
them to do unto you," and make haste to fulfil this 
acknowledged duty ; for the night of death is before 
you, the day is short. Nor has it a certain period, 
like the solar day, but its termination arrives gene- 
rally when we are least aware of its approach ? 
Therefore, my young friends, be diligent, and delay 
not to commence a life of duty to your fellow T -crea- 
tures. This is more fully prescribed to you in the 
general terms of this command, "do unto others as 
you would wish them to do unto you," than it could 
be by particular specifications, which could never 
reach, as this does, to every possible case. If you 
know that, in India, men, women and children are 
sacrificed to Juggernaut and the Ganges, if you 
know that the devil is worshipped in Africa, if you 
know that the Chinese carry a little misshapen stone 



226 A MEMOIR 

in their bosom, which they select and purchase in a 
shop, like a toy-shop, and that they pray to that 
stone, you know, that every effort you make to pro- 
mote the knowledge of the true God is a tacit con- 
fession that you do not value your religious privi- 
leges so much as to wish to contribute, with all your 
might, to the dispensation of your faith to the idola- 
trous heathen world. May the Father of our spirits 
defend you from such a distinct evidence of your 
want of faith, love and charity. May you never be 
confounded in the day of judgment, by hearing Christ 
say, "Depart from me, ye cursed — inasmuch as ye 
have not ministered unto the least of my brethren, 
ye have not ministered unto me." Oh ! beware of 
selfishi^ess ; beware of a low estimate of Christian 
duty ; beware of the insidiousness of sins of omis- 
sion, which corrode the soul like the canker-worm, 
and leave it utterly unfit for the glorious purposes 
for which God designed it. 

She thus enforces the duty of meditation : 

My meditation of him shall be sweet. — Ps. civ. 34. 

There is nothing more certain than that abstrac- 
tion of the mind from external things is necessary 
to the exercise of its higher powers. A child soon 
learns, if it has a difficult lesson to study, that it 
must find some quiet spot, secure from interruptions, 
or external things will occupy such a portion of its 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 227 

attention as will prevent the success of its most 
strenuous efforts to learn. A lawyer who has a 
deeply important and intricate argument to make, 
before a court of justice, retires to his study, and 
spends hours together in collecting his facts, ar- 
ranging and re-arranging his proofs, and examining 
the grounds of his arguments. A member of con- 
gress, who desires to offer some resolution which 
will be of vital importance to the community, gives 
his undivided attention to meditating upon every 
possible light in which the subject may be viewed, 
that he may pen it so as to conciliate enemies, as 
well as to secure friends to his cause ; and he amends 
and re-amends his plans to avoid misapprehension, 
before he submits them to the judgment of his fel- 
low-men. How imperiously necessary then is it, 
that, when we would communicate our thoughts and 
wishes to the most high God, we should previously 
meditate much upon the nature of our addresses to 
him. Would we confess our sins? How little do we 
often realize of the nature of sin in general, or our 
particular offences of commission or omission. But 
will God be satisfied with our taking a superficial 
view of our delinquencies, and thus making to him 
a confession, greatly inadequate to the actual com- 
mission of sin which he has registered against us? 
A friend, in whom you greatly confided, has injured 
you deeply, has accused you of some dishonourable 
act, which your soul abhors; but you love him still, 



228 A MEMOIR 

for he was the friend of your youth ; and although 
he has so wounded your affections you would wil- 
lingly open your heart to him, if he would but re- 
turn, saying, " I repent." After a cruel alienation, 
in which you have grieved more for his fault, than 
for your own injury, he comes to you and commences 
as you naturally anticipate an acknowledgment of 
his offence; your disappointment is then overpower- 
ing, while he says, " My dear friend, I have come 
to-day to confess that I passed you yesterday very 
rudely, but it was quite unintentional, as I was much 
engaged at the moment, and did not perceive you 
until it was too late to speak." Now, my dear 
young friends, you are all conscious that such con- 
duct would appear to you so trifling as to be highly 
insulting. What! you would think, you have for- 
gotten the most serious offence against friendship 
and justice; and you come formally to make confes- 
sion of an indifferent accident! And yet, let me 
assure you, such is probably your own daily con- 
duct to the Creator, Benefactor, Father of your 
souls. You come before him to reinstate yourself 
}n his favour, by a confession of your sins, and you 
have never even caused to pass in review before 
your own mind, what you have to confess; conse- 
quently, instead of being filled with a proper sense 
of penitence for having committed sins against a glo- 
rious and good Being, to whom you are responsible, 
and who remembers so well that which you have 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 229 

lost sight of, your spirit is slightly moved, and can- 
not possibly obtain his forgiveness, since the care- 
lessness with which you ask it is an additional 
offence. It is not thus with confession alone; but 
in preferring our supplication, it is absolutely essen- 
tial that we should reflect deeply upon the subject 
of our prayers. For this purpose we should often 
bring before our minds the many mercies by which 
we are surrounded, which are absolutely necessary 
to our happiness, and the abstraction of one of which 
would make a serious inroad upon our comfort. Let 
us, then, meditate upon the fitness of all created 
things to promote our happiness, and on the misery 
produced by the loss of any one of a thousand bless- 
ings which we are scarcely conscious of enjoying. 
We are at present enduring, perhaps with much im- 
patience, the rigors of a severe winter; but we should 
consider that many benefits depend upon this state 
of things, which are not obvious on slight observa- 
tion. The moral and physical energies are greater 
in cold climates, and the passions consequently are 
kept under better restraint. -Many other desirable 
effects are produced by cold into which we should 
inquire. We are surrounded, perhaps, by pecuniary 
difficulties; but, meditating upon the subject, we 
discover that from poverty we have learned humi- 
lity, and a content which we knew r not in our pros- 
perity. We may be too young to have experienced 
in our own person the vicissitudes of life; but very 
20 



230 A MEMOIR 

little observation and proper reflection will prove to 
us that, where the experience of all mankind can be 
ascertained, it is often diametrically opposed to the 
course of our anticipations: and thus meditation 
itself, in many ways, may convince us that we 
should reflect seriously upon every petition before 
we venture to make it to him who knows before we 
ask what things we have need of: and perhaps only 
requires us to ask that we may become more sensi- 
ble of the many mercies we are accustomed to re- 
ceive at his hands. These slight hints may suggest 
how we are prepared by meditation to make sup- 
plication to God. Would we offer praise or thanks- 
givings certainly every mental faculty must be put 
in requisition, and stirred up to its utmost energy. 
Natural science should unfold its ample page to fur- 
nish us with thoughts worthy of the Author of all 
things. We should consider the anatomv of our 
own bodies, and say with David, U I am fearfully 
and wonderfully made/ 5 We should meditate upon 
the still stranger mysteries of our moral being, until 
every power within us is called forth to offer the 
homage of grateful praise to him who made us in his 
own image, and "set his eye upon our hearts, that 
we might see the glory of his works.*' How dear 
to us are the hours we have it in our power to spend 
alone with a beloved friend! How sweet the free 
intercourse of affection! And where we cultivate 
the habit of secret communion with our heavenly 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 231 

Father, it is as much more exquisite in its enjoy- 
ment, as he is more capable of loving our souls, and 
knowing how to communicate pleasure to them. 
Did your soul ever swell with sympathy as you 
heard a noble sentiment expressed? Did tears of 
rapture ever burst unbidden from your eyes, as you 
listened to the history of a generous deed? How 
then do you feel while the God of nature unfolds to 
your meditative spirit the deep-laid plan of moral 
probation, by which his fallen creatures have been 
led through all the devious paths of sin and sorrow, 
while their "sins were made to rebuke them, and 
their iniquities to correct them," until a spirit was 
prepared within them to receive the Messiah ap- 
pointed before the foundations of the world were 
laid. Have you contemplated the history of man's 
first disobedience, and God's long-suffering and 
great kindness, until the words have burst sponta- 
neously from your lips, "Lord, what is man, that 
thou art mindful of him, or the son of man, that 
thou visitest him?" 

Meditation alone gives us just comparative views 
of the relative importance of temporal and eternal 
things. To the little, busy, bustling essence, a 
worldly mind, whose restlessness brings it in con- 
tact at every instant with a new object of interest, 
a moment is its eternity; and therefore it is, we 
have that wonderful paradox, so constantly exhibit- 
ed, a being, intended for glory, honour, and immor- 



232 A MEMOIR 

tality in eternal life, living for the perishing pursuits 
of mortality. But the mind which delights in a 
continued series of thoughts, soon learns to connect 
its being with a future state, and to estimate the su- 
perior importance of those things which last for 
ever, to those which shed their ephemeral glories 
in the passing sun-beams that gave them birth. To 
the worldly mind, the stars are " little patines of 
bright gold." To the contemplative mind, they 
are animated globes, evincing by their forms, their 
movements, their distances, their satellites and lu- 
minous atmospheres, that the Omniscient and Om- 
nipotent, who made our earth, brought forth the 
host of them together, and provided for them a 
beautiful equipoise of good. Devotion to the insig- 
nificant succession of those trifles, in which the life 
of the worldling is for ever spent, makes that next 
to nothing, to nonentity, a nameless trifle. Medi- 
tation alone can produce a Newton; and how much 
more worthy of the God of nature the admiration 
which a Newton could offer, when deep and careful 
meditation on those phenomena, which pass un- 
heeded in the trifler's sight, had opened to his cleared 
vision the long-hidden mysteries of nature's laws. 
When at once he beheld the glorious orb of day 
swung central in the immensity of space, and mea- 
sured the harmonious movements and circling orbits 
of those whirling balls, all, perhaps, like our own, 
redolent of life and bliss, what must have been the 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 233 

emotion which agitated so vast a mind, when such 
a perception burst fully upon it! How acceptable 
to the Author of creation the reflection of his own 
glory, thus cast back to him from his creature's 
mind. I can imagine that every energy of the soul 
might be thus suspended by wonder and delight; 
and that the vast tumult of such great emotions 
might find no utterance. But God sees and delights 
in beholding the glorious ecstasy of god-like minds. 
The people of Syracuse thought Archimedes a 
madman, when he sprung undressed from his bath 7 
and ran out into the street, crying aloud, "I have 
found it, I have found it!" And, perhaps, when 
he explained to them that it was not a purse of gold 
or a diamond ring which he had recovered, but an 
abstract truth that he had found, they felt still more 
convinced he had lost his senses. But it was the 
gratification of intense desire of knowledge, pro- 
duced by the mind's having long revolved anxiously 
the subject, which caused him such ecstasy. In this 
is shown the importance of meditative habits. They 
increase and strengthen the desires; and a proper 
use or an abuse of meditation is indeed the founda- 
tion of vice or virtue, wisdom or folly. Did strong 
passions spring suddenly into existence and maturity, 
they would be comparatively blameless; but the 
strength they manifest in action is to men the evi- 
dence of their habitual and undue indulgence. It 
is graceful, useful and pious to weep for the loss of 

20* 



234 A MEMOIR 

a friend; but the mind which continues absorbed in 
the contemplation of a sorrow loses the elasticity of 
the animal spirits, and sinks into a hopeless dejec- 
tion. The long-continued entertainment of any 
emotion of anger or resentment gives it a strength, 
which makes it, at last, the despotic tyrant of the 
mind. This only proves that long-continued and 
connected action of thought determines the character. 
If you would be wise, think frequently and uninter- 
ruptedly upon subjects of improving knowledge; if 
you would be virtuous, give yourself to meditating 
upon the means of being useful to mankind: if you 
would be holy and heavenly-minded, resign your- 
self often to solitary musing: 

" And hold high converse with the viewless 
Spirits that walk throughout creation's wonders, 
Hymning their Maker's praise, till sun and moon, 
And all the lesser glories of the sky, on your rapt 
Ear, in spiritual song, pour their united 
Glorious anthems, through the vast, deep 
Vaulted aisles of meditation's silent fanes, 
Where God is present, and the world shut out." 

Thus it was she endeavoured to develop the mo- 
ral faculties, and cultivate the spiritual affections of 
her pupils, teaching them that their present happi- 
ness and their future bliss are inseparably bound 
together, both alike springing from the common 
fount of that Spirit which, as a well of water, springs 
up to eternal life in the bosom of the faithful child 
of God. 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 2oo 

Delicate health had, as we before remarked, been 
the allotment of -Miss Mercer, from a very early period 
of her life; but some years before it became the means 
of liberating her struggling spirit from the bondage of 
the flesh, the symptoms of consumption of the lungs 
became too plainly manifest to permit any hesitation 
in the minds of her friends that her course was rapidly 
drawing to a close. What her own opinions were 
on the subject, no one knew, as she did not make it 
a theme for conversation. The spirituality of her 
soul was ever manifestly on the increase, and though 
bound down to the earth by the necessities of the 
circumstances in which she was placed, she was 
ever like one struggling to get free, having her 
conversation in heaven. Her letters were generally 
short, and occupied with the needful details of the 
business concerns of her school and other affairs. 
Yet even on such subjects they bore the impress of 
the mint in which they were coined, and carried 
with them the evidence that they were the produc- 
tion of a mind fixed on heavenly things. Her anxi- 
ety for the welfare of the children committed to her 
care knew no diminution. Nightly visits to their 
chambers while they slept; fires kindled with her 
own hands when too feeble to leave her own room 
with propriety; letters to their parents giving in- 
formation of the most minute particulars regarding 
their health, and comfort, and progress, — all spoke 
in the unmistakeable language of sincerity, of her 



236 A MEMOIR 

unceasing care for them. She had always felt the 

responsibility of thus assuming a parent's place, and 
familiarity with its duties had not diminished her 
estimate of it; and even after her pupils had passed 
from under her control, she continued to sympathize 
with their sorrows and griefs, and to enter into their 
joys. She was ever rejoiced at receiving letters 
from them, and the following extracts from her re- 
plies to some will exhibit the principles with which 
she endeavoured to prepare them to meet the temp- 
tations, or endure the trials of life, as their path led 
them through one or the other. Nor must it be 
forgotten that what she inculcated on her pupils, 
whether present or absent from her. she practised 
herself, Her sun was approaching its decline, and 
shone pure and bright. 

•• Soft as that halloTrei light that b.::s : 
\> hen ail gel minstrels to die siiepnercs sung, 

One in daily intercourse with her. remarks: "She 
seemed already in spirit an inhabitant of that hea- 
ven toward which she was hastening.'* 

A pupil to whom she was much attached, and 
whose course she watched with affectionate solici- 
tude, wrote to solicit her advice on the subject of 
worldly conformity; to whom she returned the fol- 
lowing reply: — 

"I hope, my dear Mary, you have thought of ail 
the various sources of anxiety which occupy me at 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 237 

this season, and attributed to the only true cause. 
my apparent neglect of your sweet letters. 

"Never doubt, my dear child, that my heart is 
deeply interested in your welfare, and that my ad- 
vice shall never be withheld when it can guard you 
from danger, or incite you to what is good. 

" The subject upon which you ask my opinion, is 
one which has been often and much discussed, and 
many ingenious things have been said upon the popu- 
lar side, calculated to bewilder the conscience of a 
young casuist: but, my dear, I believe every thing 
may be answered which can be urged upon that side. 

" If all were true Christians, would there be any 
full-dressed balls — any Parisian fashions? Would 
the extremes of poverty and suffering, of splendour 
and luxury be found in the adjoining houses? And 
would women, stifling all kind and generous sympa- 
thies, pass by the door of indigence and sorrow to 
revel in thoughtless vanity, in the dwellings of self- 
ish sensuality? — I think we may answer, — certainly 
not. If all were real Christians, we should love 
our neighbours as ourselves. The poor Samaritan 
would be owned as our neighbour, and to pour oil 
and balm into the wounds of the suffering would 
be as much the pleasure of every Christian as it 
was that of their Lord and Master. Now, if all this 
is true, — and who can deny it? — then all the world 
are wrong in the direction of their tastes — wrong 
in the appropriation of their time, and wealth, and 



838 A MEMOIR 

whatsoever other talents the Lord has committed 
to them : and the best service that can be done them, 
is to prove practically 'so that they cannot deny it] 
that the follower of the Lord Jesus has a pleasure 
in serving the Lord, in labouring for the improve- 
ment of the ignorant and the relief of the indig 
that the worldly-minded cannot have in ail his 
selfish pursuits. Live so as to prove this, my own 
dear Mary, and you will do more for the peace and 
comfort of those around you. as well as for the fu- 
ture happiness of your own soul, than in any con- 
formity to what you do not approve. 

" Be cautious in condemning others, except by 
the tenor of your own life; but never give in to 
what your heart condemns from a weak fear of 
giving offence. I have for a considerable portion 
of my own life been contending with these sophis- 
tical suggestions of the enemy of souls; but ;, 'resis: 
the devil, and he will flee from you."'' When he 
sees you are bent upon serving God, all he can do 
is to persuade you that you are wrong in your ideas 
of religion and holiness, and that you must serve 
the Lord without appearing different from his liege 
subjects. Now this is a trick of the old Adam, 
and without affecting any thing, just follow that 
which is right; spend the short span of your life in 
doing all the good you can. and let the appearances 
follow in regular sequence from the nature of things. 
It is natural to look for figs on a fig-tree. It is 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER, 239 

nothing but natural to perceive good works abound- 
ing where persons are under the influence of the 
Holy Spirit. There can be no pride, arrogance, 
vanity, pharisaical boasting, or despising others, but 
modest and humble zeal to do all one's duty, and 
when it is done, to say we are unprofitable ser- 
vants ; to rejoice in the Lord continually, because 
of his infinite mercy to sinners; to condemn no one, 
because we know we deserve to be condemned our- 
selves. These are the signs of being in Christ." 
And again she writes to the same. 

My dearest Mart: 

1 hope you have not thought it hard, that I should 
be so long in answering your letter — most welcome 
letter. The truth is, I returned to such a state of 
confusion here, and had such difficulty in getting 
ready for the reception of the girls, that I could not 
spare one hour. Even when the 1st of October 
came, I was far from being ready, and this is the 
first day I could spare an hour; yet, do not believe, 
my sweet and very dear child, that I did not thank 
our heavenly Father for the blessing which he has 
shed on you. Oh ! may its healing influence be 
daily stronger and stronger, until your whole being 
shall partake of the Divine nature. 

Allow nothing — nothing — neither reproach nor 
ridicule, neither the allurements of society nor the 
example of others, to draw you off, and u separate 
you from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus 



240 A MEMOIR 

our Lord." And above all things, my dear, honour 
your profession by a consistent walk. Study, with 
a serious apprehension of the awful holiness of the 
great Jehovah, to do nothing in your Christian cha- 
racter unadvisedly, but remember that Christ is 
judged by a thoughtless world, from the walk and 
conversation of his people. It is not your own 
character which is at stake, but it is the character 
of your Master; therefore be wise as a serpent, 
while you are harmless as a dove. "Whatsoever 
things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good re- 
port, if there be any virtue, if there be any praise, 
think of these things." Be a thousand times more 
diligent than before in the performance of all your 
duties, and do all with a cheerful spirit. Make re- 
ligion lovely and attractive to all who witness its 
power in you; and pray every day that the Lord 
would give you grace to honour him, and so to set 
forth his praise by your actions, that men may see 
your good works and glorify your Father which is 
in heaven. 

I find, with some persons, our recent interest in 
the subject of religion is not very popular. That, 
and my being so long away, without getting my 
circular published, has thrown me behindhand. I 
shall begin with forty-six scholars, not counting 
Grace and Jane, although, to secure my full number, 
I engaged several more than fifty; I did intend to 
confine myself to forty, but the arrangements of this 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 241 

year have been so expensive that I ought to have my 
full number to meet all my payments. 

You cannot think how beautifully every thing is 
arranged. The dressing-room is the most complete 
establishment; I have the most perfect pump, which 
draws the water from the bottom of the well into 
the dressing-room ; then a large boiler with a flue, 
which passes entirely round the room, and will keep 
it perfectly warm at all hours ; a large reservoir for 
warm water, and a spacious bath; the compartments 
are furnished each with a cup and basin, and there 
can hardly be any thing sweeter or more convenient. 
Then there is a dry walk for the morning; but I 
cannot tell you half I have done since you were here. 
I wish you would come over and see every thing, 
and tell me, my dear, all your recent experience. 

Farewell, my dear child; hold fast to the anchor 
of your hopes, and may the Giver of all grace make 
you truly and wholly his own, is the prayer of, 
Your tenderly attached friend, 
M. Mercer. 

I wish you and Rosina would take advantage of 
this occasion to come over; I have so few with me 
that I should enjoy your visit of all things. Give 
my most affectionate remembrances to your papa, 
mamma, and your sisters. 

To one suffering under bodily disease, she thus 
writes: 

21 



242 A MEMOIR 

" Your letter, my very dear young friend, which 
I received by the last mail but one, found me in the 
midst of the bustle of dismissing my school for va- 
cation ; and I postponed answering it until I could 

command an hour of quiet. Yesterday Miss C , 

Miss I , and the last but one of the girls w T ho 

are to go, left us ; and this morning I have seated 
myself to express to you my sincere grief in your 
suffering, and at the same time the consolation I 
derive from hearing from your dear aunt how pa- 
tient the grace of God has made you under such 
accumulated trials. Praised be his holy name, that 
in the midst of his chastenings he has poured out 
his precious consolations upon you, and enabled you 
to kiss the rod. Yours, dearest Mary, are afflictions 
less severe than those of Job ; but oh ! how T far more 
powerful the means provided to sustain your faith 
than those which kept that of the suffering patriarch 
from fainting. From the depths of his grief, he 
cried out, < Oh ! that thou wouldst appoint me a set 
time, and remember me/ But you, my dear child, 
God has remembered in his mercy in the fulness of 
time, and the set time of your salvation has come. 
Oh ! what a difference ! Job saw as through a glass, 
darkly, and he exclaimed, ' I know that my Re- 
deemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter 
day upon the earth;' but your Redeemer has been 
fully revealed; He has stood upon the earth, He has 
finished the work of your salvation, and now He is 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 243 

with you always as the Comforter whose strength is 
sufficient for all your need. I should be very thank- 
ful if I could see you, and talk with you of the 
mercies of God in Christ; but, if we must not in the 
flesh, in the spirit we are permitted to commune, 
and this is far beyond any earthly blessing. You 
will hear with pleasure, I am sure, that six of our 
little flock last Sunday united themselves with the 
Saviour in the communion of his body and blood. 
God grant them grace to be faithful. Every one 
here, my dear child, feels the deepest sympathy in 
your sufferings, and all unite in praying to God (if 
it seems good in his eyes,) to raise you up to health 
and usefulness ; if not, that he would himself be with 
you in all your trials, smooth the bed of sickness, 
strengthen the fainting spirit, confirm your faith, 
brighten your hopes, give you clearer views of 
eternal peace and joy in heaven, and never leave 
you until he places you with him who purchased 
you with the precious price of his own blood, that 
you might be like him, and be with him for ever- 
more, at the right hand of the throne of glory. Amen, 
so be it. With sincerest affection, I am, 

"Dear , your friend in Christ, 

"M. Mercer." 

And again, after the lapse of a year : 

"I am afraid, my dear , you have thought we 

were all too busy at Belmont to remember our ab- 



244 A memoir" 

sent friends; but indeed it has not been so, and often 
in our conversations we speak of you, and when our 
united prayers are addressed to God for his blessing 
and consolation for those who are suffering in mind 
or body, we especially pray for a blessing upon you. 
Dear child, what an alleviation of affliction it is to 
remember that those whom God loves he purifies in 
the fire; and how sweet to lie passive in the arms 
of redeeming love, and acknowledge that w T e have 
no need of any work of our own to please the 
Father, because he loves us for the blessed Saviour's 
sake; and that the more we feel our unworthiness, 
the more we are enabled to appreciate the Lamb who 
was slain for us, and made a full and sufficient sa- 
crifice and oblation for all our sins. I should have 

written to you before, dear , but my school 

opened this session with a much larger number of 
scholars; and many new ones demand much in- 
creased care in every way ; it is almost like opening 
a new school, and for the last four or five weeks we 
have had the prevailing influenza among us. To- 
day school opened after Christmas holidays, and at 
this moment the pupils are in the school-room, with 
Miss Condy in the desk, in study-hour; and I have 
seated myself to write you a few lines of affectionate 
remembrance, and to beg to hear from you how you 
are, and whether you are enabled to glorify your 
heavenly Father by a patient waiting on Him in the 
weariness of a sick room. I have just received from 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 245 

New York a present of a little book, which I should 
greatly love to send you. It is the ' Memoir of an 
Only Daughter/ who, during a long, painful illness, 
gave such precious evidences of willingness to suffer 
her heavenly Father's will, that it was the greatest 
consolation to her parents. I do not think we ever 
estimate the infinite goodness of God until we have 
felt that it is good for us that we have been afflicted. 
So long as the fleeting world and its perishable pur- 
suits keep our hopes of worldly happiness and dis- 
tinction alive, ambition and the love of pleasure con- 
tinue to disquiet us; but when long sickness has 
taught us by sad experience how little earthly things 
are to be trusted to, we perceive the superior excel- 
lence of those objects of desire and hope which are 
at God's right hand for evermore. The dear girls 
here afford me but too many affecting proofs of this. 
They are so young, so full of natural sympathy with 
the world and worldly things, that they continually 
fall back in the walk of faith. At this season of the 
year, however, I seldom see much attention to re- 
ligion, and must continue, in implicit confidence 
that the seed of the word will bring forth its ap- 
pointed fruit, to labour and wait patiently on the 
Lord. Dear Mr. Adie comes to us very constantly, 

and does all that he can for us. is not w T ith us 

this winter, but will return in the spring. We all 

love you, dear Mary, and poor often comes to 

me to ask if I have heard lately from you. Girls, 
21* 



246 A MEMOIR 

teachers, servants, all desire to hear good news from 
you. Will you write and tell us how you are, and 
if you are not well enough, give my love to your 
kind aunt, and ask her, please to write for you. and 
do not omit to say how your mamma is ; and be as- 
sured that I take the deepest interest, not only in 
your spiritual and eternal welfare: but that it may 
please our heavenly Father to strew your path 
through this vale of tears with every comfort and 
pleasure which is consistent with your eternal feli- 
city, is the sincere and devout prayer of 

•'• Your affectionate friend, 

K A£ Mercer. ?? 

"The girls would write, or send messages, but 
are all in school." 

To one of her pupils, suffering from bereavement: 

"I have been thinking of you, my dear , 



with much affection and sympathy ever since you 
left us, but you know how impossible it is for me to 
command a quiet hour to devote to a friend, and I 
knew that your time was most usefully employed. 
I could not wish you to be in a school where you 
would learn more important lessons. May God 
bless them, dearest , not only to your everlast- 
ing good, but to your temporal peace and happiness. 
Nothing, my child, is more manifest to the Chris- 
tian, than that such afflictions and bereavements as 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 247 

our heavenly Father inflicts upon us are necessary 
to wean our thoughts and affections from worldly 
things. The things which perish, we must learn to 
give up cheerfully; the friends that are taken away, 
and leave us here, we must learn to consider as gone 
before us, and resign them to our universal Parent. 
Thus, when we are taught of God to acquiesce in 
His best, wisest, will, all contention of our rebel- 
lious wills subsides, and peace settles like a dove upon 
the soul : this is that fc ' peace of God which passeth 
all understanding.' Soon may you see its power- 
ful consolation poured out upon , in whose griefs 

I have deeply sympathized, although I felt that as 
there is a joy, so there is a sorrow in which the 
stranger meddleth not, and I have blessed God, that 
he who saith, <Lo, I am with 3-ou always,' has pro- 
mised himself to be our Comforter; that He is at 
hand, ever in the hearts of those whose bruised and 
broken spirits are looking to Him for consolation. 

"I heard, dear , soon after you went down, 

that you were to be confirmed, and I have been 
wishing much to hear that you had thus entered 
upon the covenanted privileges of the external 
church. I am sure you will be very much strength- 
ened by feeling that you obeyed the command of 
our Lord, and, by your own voluntary act, confessed 
Him before men, knowing that He has pledged him- 
self, if you do, to confess you before the angels. 
Let me advise you, dear child, if you have joined the 



24S A MEMOIR 

visible church, to have much in mind that the church 
upon earth is visible by the spiritual light which 
shines through our actions, making it evident that 
Christ dwells in us, the hope of glory. Let it be 
seen that a higher and more elevated view of the 
privileges, responsibilities, and pleasures of human 
life, prove you to be a co-heir with Christ in eternal 
glory. Does it not seem to you a mystery too 
wonderful to believe, and will you not resolve, in 
gratitude for his wonderful love, to love him su- 
premely, considering the honour of his name, and 
the advancement of his kingdom upon earth, as the 
object best worth living for? Will you not devote 
yourself, all that you have, all that you are, to His 
service? knowing that this is the condition of the 
covenant of eternal life." 

Miss Mercer had devoted herself to the examina- 
tion of the nature of the Sacraments, and a careful in- 
vestigation of the position they should occupy in the 
estimation of the faithful believer in Jesus. Among 
her papers, there is a long list of references to passages 
of the word of God, establishing their authority, and 
throwing light upon the purpose of their institution 
and the character of their influence on the soul; 
which w T as evidently designed to furnish the notes 
on which she founded her instructions to her pupils. 
As it would be impossible to clothe the skeleton 
with the connecting points and arguments by which 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 249 

its positions are sustained, there could be no interest 
in it to the reader not accustomed to follow her 
modes of thinking and illustrations. 

The following extracts from letters to two of her 
pupils, written in September, 1843, will better ex- 
hibit her views on the subject of the Lord's Supper. 

" I fear my dear little god-daughter has thought me 
very remiss in not writing before, but my time has 
been filled with such a variety of occupations, and I 
have been flying about at such a rate, that I have not 
really had leisure for letter writing, and you know, 
dear Nannie, you challenge me to a discussion which 
might have involved me in trouble, in these dis- 
turbed times, when you asked me what I thought 
of Dr. Pusey's sermon? It would have taken no 
time, dearest Nannie, to tell you that I really thought 
nothing of it; — but as many persons disagree with 
me, I should think myself bound by the apostolic 
injunction to "Be ready to give a reason of the hope 
that is in me." I tell you, then, since you are in- 
quiring upon this subject, that if I understand Doc- 
tor Pusey and his followers who are now producing 
such a sensation in the world, they are contending 
insidiously for an exclusive authority in the Priest- 
hood, to extend according to their own pleasure the 
bread of life, and to deny it to whom they will, by 
establishing the doctrine that the Eucharist involves 
a miracle by which the communicant actually eats 



250 A MEMOIR 

the flesh and drinks the blood of the Son of God 
which was shed upon the cross. Now this I hold 
to be not only contrary to Revelation, but contrary 
to possibility: were I to enter upon my reasons for 
so thinking, I should transcend greatly the limits 
of a letter, but I mean to make the Eucharist the 
subject of one of our sweet Bible lessons when 
school meets. The Bible, after all, is its own best 
interpreter." 

A former pupil, at the time of writing an as- 
sistant in her school, had apologized for not return- 
ing at the time of opening, by expressing her wish 
to remain in Baltimore for the purpose of partici- 
pating in this ordinance. Miss M. replies, 

My dear God-daughter: 

I thank you for your sweet letter, and cannot but 
rejoice that you have such a motive for wishing to 
remain in Baltimore. May God bless the precious 
ordinance to the purifying and strengthening of 
your soul. May you be enabled to discern the 
Lord's body in His holy sacraments, not according 
to the unprofitable sense which He himself con- 
demns, but as having an earnest realizing percep- 
tion, discrimination, and consideration of the real 
agony and passion of His crucified body, by which 
He redeemed you from the sentence which had 
gone out from the infinite justice of a Holy God 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 251 

against all transgression of His law. Surely they 
who made themselves drunk, committing excesses 
at the Lord's table, had no such spiritual discern- 
ment or perception that Christ had actually suffered 
in the body for them. 

Thus it is, dear H =-, that Christians feed on 

Christ's body by faith with thanksgiving. Our souls, 
born of the Spirit of God, are nourished unto eter- 
nal life by the worthiness of the sacrifice and atone- 
ment made in His flesh; and if we do not discern 
this fact in the communion of the Eucharist, we 
profane its sanctity, by taking away its affecting 
signification. I have not a moment more than to 

add that Miss is coming home again, and we 

shall have a sweet domicile. Ever with prayer to 
our Heavenly Father, that He may have you in his 
holy keeping, your affectionate friend, 

M. Mercer. 

To the same lady, at another time, she thus writes 
on a scrap of paper: 

has given me this little sheet to write 



you a few words of kindness, my own dear God- 
child, which I hope will set your pen to running. 
I long to receive the assurance of your unabated 
enjoyment of the u love of God," which He has so 
graciously poured out upon you. 

This morning at prayers I thought I felt a more 
distinct and realizing sense of the preciousness of 



252 A MEMOIR 

Christ's plan of atonement by uniting in Himself 
the majesty and glory of the Godhead with the hu- 
mility of the man, than I ever felt before, and I 
thought, " Never man spake like this man." I won- 
dered at the " beauty of holiness," the splendour 
of Divinity softened down to our feeble vision by the 
veil of humanity, by the sympathies, the sorrows, 
the deep tenderness of our nature, .... Dear, dear 
H., ever yours in the sacred bonds of Christian 
love, M. Mercer. 

The following extracts are from letters written 
to a favourite pupil, who had engaged in the same 
path of duty as that so faithfully trod by Miss Mer- 
cer; one, of whom she always spoke with the warm- 
est affection, and in whose welfare she was especial- 
ly interested. 

My dear : 



My confidence in the generous affection which 
you have always shown me makes me trust, that, 
badly as I have treated your many kind letters, you 
will still be glad to receive this; indeed, my dear 

, if you examine this handwriting, you will 

find that I am really losing the use of my pen. I 
have, in truth, all this spring and summer, been al- 
most incapable of writing; for my mind has been 
disabled by rheumatism in my head, and my hands 
have been rigid with the weakness of my muscles, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 253 

until I can scarcely write legibly; the lines go 
jerking here and there as if I had St. Vitus's dance. 
Notwithstanding, I am better since I take constant 
exercise in the open air; and if you do not make 
your appearance here very soon with the children, 
you will see me at West River before you get here. 
I am so much occupied now with closing the 
school, that I can attend to little else : accounts to 
settle, certificates to make out, examinations to 
close. It is a busy and a very painful scene, — so 
many interesting young persons dispersing never to 

meet again. The seem greatly distressed. 

is very anxious to remain; indeed, there are 

many of the girls who would be greatly improved 
by returning, and I mourn to think how they are 
launching out into the world, anticipating nothing 
but pleasure, and destined to meet with disappoint- 
ment and griefs at every step. Several things have 
lately occurred to make me feel the importance of 
early education, so much, that I would not give up 

keeping school, for the world. Dear , it is a 

great Christian privilege to form the principles of 
little children. Never relax your energies, but be 
sure "your labours are not in vain in the Lord." 
I have this morning read a report of the condition 
of the children of the colliers in England, that has 
set in energetic motion every drop of blood in my 
heart. Oliver Twist and Squeers' school, the small 
servant, and Bulwer's factory children, are all feli- 
. 22 



254 A MEMOIR 

citous pictures of infantine happiness compared with 
these little victims. Teach as long as you can, dear 

, and thank God for giving you the noblest 

employment on earth, and some of these days our 
heavenly Father may enable you and me to set up 
a Charity School on a noble plan." 

Thus highly did she estimate, as a privilege, what 
inferior minds regard as servile duty; and thus, 
though w T orn out by labour and disease, did her 
ardent love to her Redeemer, and anxious interest 
in the lambs of his flock, induce her to anticipate, 
as her greatest blessing upon earth, the opportunity 
for more extended labour in his cause. 

After the lapse of a year she again writes to the 
same young friend, to whom she had confided the 
education of a family especially dear to her. 

"I am grieved, indeed, myown dear little , 

to hear from , that you were not well, and that 

your health and your blessed spirit were suffering 
together, and, I assure you, I have thought of you 
constantly since. There are many mysteries in the 
ways of God to man, but none that produces more 
awe in my mind than the dependence of mind and 
body upon each other. How severe are often the 
afflictions inflicted upon the one by the evils which 
befall the other! and yet again, we sometimes see 
the body perish in agonies, and the soul renewed day 
by day, until the mortal falls off without a struggle, 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 255 

and leaves the soul in glory; while yet again, ano- 
ther soul seems to consume away, until the man 
appears to walk the earth, in health and full enjoy- 
ment of earth and earthly things, without a living 
soul, more than the beasts that perish. May we die 
the death of the righteous, and our last end be like 
his; and for this end, as well as that we may enter 
into the joys of our Lord, where Christ sits at the 
right hand of God, let us, dearest — — , renew con- 
tinually our covenant with God, and count all things 
as less than nothing, which have no bearing upon 
our spiritual good. I read yesterday some reflec- 
tions upon the importance of exercising personal 
influence. Baxter's ' Saint's Rest' converted Dod- 
dridge, Doddridge wrote the ' Rise and Progress,' 
this converted Wilberforce, Wilberforce's 'Practical 
View' converted Legh Richmond. Now, consider 
the blessing conferred upon the earth by the influ- 
ence of all these great men and their works, and 
think how little the instrument of God, who planted 
and watered the seed to which God gave such in- 
crease, in the heart of that poor little sickly child, 
Richard Baxter, knew of what she was doing. Take 

courage, dearest . The smallest things are most 

apt to be magnified by God to his own glory; and 
if you labour and pray in faith for these children 
that He has given you, who knows but you may 

live to see a preacher of the glorious Gospel, 

perhaps a successful missionary, and those precious 



256 A MEMOIR 

little girls ! You and I have no right to doubt 

but that we ourselves are of that holy priesthood, 
that peculiar people, whom God has made and not 

man, who are heirs of salvation; and so may 

and be. Do not doubt it. You have three 

very promising and interesting beings committed 
to your teaching, and be satisfied. 

"But now, dearest , I am anxious to know if 

there is any serious indisposition of body; if so, try 
change of air. Come up to me. I love you, my 
dear child, as one of my own family, and since I 

hear you are not well, I am anxious to see you 

Courage, my own dear child! remember you are 
an elect angel, and wait with patience your appointed 
time. Write to me, and be sure to tell me how 
you are, and every thing you are thinking about. 
Yours, with supplication, to the Author and Giver of 
all good, for your temporal and eternal happiness." 

TO MISS . 

"October 3. 

"Thank you, my dearest , for your kind letter. 

Why talk to me of flattering you? Dear , 

let not so odious a word be ever named between us. 
May the blessing of language be taken from me if 
ever I knowingly flatter, or fail to be candid with 
you. I long to hear from you. I desire, above all 
things, to feel that you have written to me impul- 
sively, because I value your souPs immortal good, 
and I would like to know that your heart was set 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 257 

upon heavenly things, that you were bent upon 
making your calling and election sure, that your eye 
was ever upon the mark for the prize of your high 
calling in Christ Jesus, and that, with a jealous 
anxiety, you were labouring to secure the spotless 
robe of Christ's righteousness, 'Keep yourself un- 
spotted from the world!' I have watched over you 
for one year with a Christian mother's heart, and 
none but a mother could appreciate the deep inte- 
rest I feel in your welfare. 

"October 10th. 

"Since the first date, dearest , this page has 

been lying waiting for me to have time to continue 
it, and, at this distance of time, I have to send it. 
.'.... I have really not had an hour since, free 
from important engagements, and I must send the 
fragment to show you that it is not because I do 
not love you, and think of you, that I do not write. 

Believe, dear , under all circumstances, that I 

love you dearly, and pray for the choicest blessings 
of God for you. Write to me when you can. 
Love me, and be sure to meet me in heaven. If 
we both strive lawfully, we shall have sweet and 
holy communion in the mansions that our blessed 
Saviour will inhabit with us. Remember me affec- 
tionately to your household. A common interest 
binds me to them all, and you are that bond of 
union. Take the pin I gave you to the jeweller's, 

22* 



258 A MEMOIR 

and have engraved on the back, * Love not the 
world, 9 and keep it as a memento. 

"Farewell. I am ever the same, and thank God 
daily that he sent you to Belmont." 

The latest effort of Miss Mercer's pen was the 
letter to Miss Coxe, which has been given, as sent 
to her, on a previous page. A rough draft, (the 
only rough draft of her letters known to exist, she 
ever wrote, as she spoke, with perfect readiness and 
great precision, and sent her letters as the first 
impress of her mind,) contains the following addi- 
tional paragraphs, which her modest feeling caused 
her to suppress, but which may well be introduced 
as the conclusion of her character. 

" I hold evening prayers, and have for twenty- 
years been in the habit of reading a chapter and 
selecting from it some striking practical text to 
enforce by such appeals as I am able to make to 
their hearts and consciences. In the commence- 
ment of the session I seldom see any marked inte- 
rest in the subject, but after a winter spent in regular 
exercises, a sermon, or any unexpected circumstance, 
as the reading aloud of a fine tract, such as Little 
Jane, or the Dairyman's Daughter, seems to fall like 
a spark among combustibles; the heat is communi- 
cated by sympathy, as electrically, and soon the 
whole school is in a state of irrepressible feeling; 
for observe, however I labour to excite feeling where 
there is none, I exert myself to the utmost to check 



OP MISS MARGARET MERCER. 259 

the fervour of this feeling, so as to put out the ani- 
mal heat, which may have been generated in the 
deep fermentation. I endeavour to test the reality 
of the impression which has been made, and I have 
never found but that real feeling became stronger 
by such opposition. 

"I am growing so old that nothing affords me 
more grateful emotion than to find such zeal and 
abilities as you appear to possess, employed in the 
service of God in a field of labour so capable of 
rendering an abundant return, and in which I have 
found so few engage in a right spirit. May such a 
missionary be raised up to take the place which I 
must soon vacate. 

"I look around in vain for a brave, and noble, 
and fearless, and daring faith, which 

" ' Holds no parley with unmanly fears, 
Where duty points, still confidently steers; 
Faces a thousand dangers at her call, 
And trusting in her God surmounts them all.' 

"I have first-rate teachers, but they are modest, 
and have not that confident zeal which arrests the 
feelings of the young and holds them bound. It is 
certainly a peculiar talent which God commits to 
some, and which even superior minds do not always 
possess, that of speaking freely to the young. I 
nothing extenuate, but I generally make them admit 
that I set down naught in malice, and under this 



260 A MEMOIR 

impression nothing offends them. But I am afraid 
of egotism; for, after all, I have nothing to add to 
my first confession, that "God has blessed me." 
May He bless you, dear madam, is the sincere prayer 
of your friend in Christ, M. Mercer. 

We are now approaching the period at which this 
sanctified servant of the Lord was to change her state 
of existence; to pass from the sphere of our vision, 
which she had gladdened with the rays of light re- 
flected upon us from the face of that Saviour whom 
she so loved and served. 

The approach of this period was manifested to all 
but herself, as much by the softened yet increased 
radiance she shed around her, as by the failure of 
the frail yet beauteous tenement, in which the spirit 
was enshrined. It was not only that the "battered 
and decaying cottage of the soul let in new light " 
through the rending walls which foretokened its 
taking down, but the same enlarging rents gave exit 
also to brighter rays. The approaching marriage of 
a niece, over whose development of character and 
growth to womanhood she had watched with an 
interest almost, if not quite, maternal, called forth 
anxious efforts to promote her happiness and that of 
her family, in addition to the usual exertions of her 
school. While she herself appeared not to realize 
her position, at least took no direct notice of it, to 
those around her all her goings out and in among 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 261 

those to whose comfort and blessing she had so long 
ministered, partook of a hallowed influence, such as 
is communicated to the heart by that touching lan- 
guage of the apostle at Miletus, "Behold, now I 
know that all you who have seen my going out and 
coming in among you shall see my face no more." 
At the time of the marriage festivities, she left Bel- 
mont for Cedar Park, and there entered, with all the 
animation and zest of affectionate interest, into the 
happiness of that occasion. She now, as always, 
took pleasure in witnessing and promoting the hap- 
piness of others, and mingled freely and with cheer- 
ful sympathy in the large and loving circle of rela- 
tives and friends there assembled. But as they 
gazed upon her, it was to feel toward her as toward 
a higher and holier intelligence; "Velut, inter 
stellas luna minores." It was during the time now 
spent at Cedar Park that the author was favoured 
with his last intercourse with her. There was one 
evening especially impressed upon him. Feeling 
conscious that the frailty of her body needed rest, 
she forsook for a few hours the house of feasting, 
and spent them with himself and family in quiet in- 
tercourse. The place was endeared to her by early 
associations. It had been the residence of one of 
whom she spoke frequently after the death of her 
own mother, as occupying a place in her heart se- 
cond to that only which none but a mother can fill 
—a house to which from her earliest years she had 



262 A memoir 

been accustomed to resort with all the freedom of 
affectionate interest in its occupants; and where, 
moreover, she had put forth frequent and strenuous 
efforts to bind up the broken-hearted, and minister 
not only the comfort of sympathy, but spiritual 
instruction and consolation to those who mourned 
under severe afflictions: and she came to transfer 
the same feelings to those by whom it was now oc- 
cupied, who had ever looked up to her with reverent 
affection. To describe the circumstances or detail 
the conversation which passed, were impossible. In 
the souls of those of kindred feelings it may be that 
a mere allusion to them will awaken the vibrations 
of kindred chords, and thus enable them to form a 
conception of their character. It was one of those 
occasions, K privileged beyond the common walk of 
life." She looked around upon the beauties of nature, 
and upward to the starry heavens, and in each found 
a theme. But for every theme she had a higher in- 
spiration, and dwelt upon the beauties of earth, and 
the glories of heaven, till it appeared as though she 
were some strong spiritual intelligence, bearing us 
upward in her own heavenward flight toward the 
very footstool of the throne of the Majesty on high; 
and as the language of love fell from her lips, 

■ Celestial odours filled the circuit wide, 
And told us whence her treasures were supplied/' 

Yet while her spiritual and intellectual powers 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 263 

were thus vigorous, so feeble was her bodily frame, 
that it was not without painful apprehension we 
watched the indescribable brightness of her eye, and 
listened to the rich melody of her voice; and when 
at a late hour she parted from us, it was with the full 
conviction that we should meet no more unless to 
partake together of kindred and yet purer joys, in 
the courts of that mansion toward which she had 
been the instrument of thus drawing our souls. 

Before returning to Belmont, it had been her in- 
tention to make an excursion to the North, in hope 
of invigorating her frame for the renewal of those 
duties to which she had been so long devoted, and 
in the discharge of which she had determined to 
spend her strength to the very last. But the ac- 
count reached her of the sickness of a friend in 
Virginia, whom she loved most tenderly, and con- 
trary to the judgment and wishes of those friends 
about her, she determined to abandon the excursion 
for her own benefit, and hasten to the comfort of 
the sick. 

Upon her return from this visit a circumstance 
occurred which exhibits at once the decided cha- 
racter of her mind, and the influence which a feeble 
instrument may produce when dedicated to the ser- 
vice of God, and accompanied in its actings by the 
power of his Spirit. It was neeessary for her to 
take the steamboat from Norfolk to Baltimore, and 
she planned her journey so that she should embark 



264 A MEMOIR 

upon it on the Saturday afternoon, and reach Balti- 
more at a very early hour on the next morning. 
Driving into town without inquiry, she was put upon 
the boat just as it left the wharf. It would be im- 
possible for any one not familiar with her character 
to judge of her dismay, when, too late to recede, she 
discovered that the boat was not to make its usual 
trip, but conveyed a party of pleasure with a band 
of music and preparations for spending the sacred 
day in dancing and merriment upon the w r ater. At 
the breakfast table, Miss Mercer made some remarks, 
the tenor of which is unknown, but the effect was 
such that this purpose was laid aside, at least so far 
as the noisy revelry was concerned. Thus was her 
unflinching discharge of duty instrumental in pro- 
moting her own comfort, and w T e may well indulge 
the hope that its ultimate effect upon the souls of 
some may be found to glory and honour in the day 
of the appearing of that Lord whom she loved and 
glorified. 

She reached Belmont in a state of great exhaus- 
tion of body, and appears to have entertained seri- 
ously an intention to abandon her more extended 
engagements, and devote herself to the instruction 
of a limited number of pupils. She felt that the care 
of her large establishment was too much for her en- 
feebled physical powers, and yet the energy of the 
intellect and the warmth of the spirit were un- 
quenched, and the same singleness of purpose and 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 265 

determination of mind which enabled her to enter 
upon the path of duty when few would have failed 
to find sufficient reason for self-indulgence in her 
feeble health, still urged her to persevere until she 
should fall, worn out in the service of her Master. 

Of this determination she spake little, or not at 
all, to her friends and associates. It is chiefly in- 
ferred from the fact of her having at this time pre- 
pared an advertisement of the Belmont property for 
sale. Though there were circumstances which 
pressed with peculiar power upon her spirits at this 
time, she continued to discharge her duties with her 
wonted energy and cheerfulness, and so utterly un- 
mindful of her own condition, and disregardful of 
what was necessary for her own health, that within 
a very short period of her death she spent two con- 
secutive nights in watching by the bed-side of some 
pupils who were sick. 

But the hour of her departure was at hand. 
Wasted and worn out in the service of her soul, the 
body by which it was enthralled was now to be laid 
aside. Willing as she was still to labour in the 
cause of her Redeemer, patience had accomplished 
its perfect work. The appointed time was come, at 
which she was to hear the glad announcement of 
"Well done, good and faithful servant! enter thou 
into the joy of thy Lord." The urgency of her 
cough, together with the feebleness of her frame, 
rendered it necessary to resort to remedies, the in- 
23 



266 A MEMOIR 

fluence of which kept her slumbering, and thus pre- 
vented her from the expression of her feelings at 
this time. However consoling it might have been 
to listen to the unfoldings of the spirit just ready to 
enter upon its recompense of reward, there could be 
no necessity for any other testimony of her accep- 
tance than that afforded by the fruits of the Spirit so 
long produced in her daily devotion to the service 
of her Lord; and with the simple declaration of the 
apostle, that it was "Jar belter to depart and be 
with Christ" as her only but all-sufficient evidence 
of the prospect before her, she "rested from her 
labours." 

The following letter, written by one who had 
been for years associated with her in those labours, 
and who partook largely of her affections, conveys 
the sad detail of the closing scene: 

" She was in the first instance attacked by one 
of her usual bad colds, and kept her room for seve- 
ral days, and sent for the physician, who resorted 
to his usual remedy, a blister, which seemed to re- 
lieve her; and after three days of confinement she 
told us all that she was much better, and hoped 
soon to be down stairs. Her cough, however, was 
so violent on Wednesday, that she was quite ex- 
hausted by it, and appeared alarmingly weak. Miss 
I. and myself were sitting in her room about nine 
o'clock, when she called Miss I. to her and said she 
wished her to take my usual place by her side that 



OF MISS MARGARET MERCER, 267 

night. I accordingly went down stairs to sleep, 
but about three o'clock in the morning was roused, 
and hastened to the room. As I approached the 
foot of the bed, I heard her say, < Gone! I am gone!' 
Mrs. M. replied, i Do not say so, my darling sister.' 
Her answer was, ' I am not afraid to die; it is 
sweet to depart and be with Christ^ We sent 
immediately for the physician, but it was too late. 
From four in the morning to about two p. m., she 
continued in a kind of stupor, only reviving now 
and then to take nourishment, and then calmly and 
gently breathed her last." 

It were impossible, even were it attempted, for 
any pen to delineate the sad effect of the death of 
Miss Mercer, not only upon her immediate house- 
hold and friends, but upon the neighbourhood she 
had so signally blessed. She found it, in a moral 
point of view, a wilderness, and by her labours it 
had been made truly to blossom as the rose. Where 
only ten short years before she had met with nothing 
but hostility to her plans, she now experienced no 
other feeling than love. Those who had resorted 
to every means in their power to thwart her efforts, 
impair her usefulness, and destroy her reputation, 
now mourned over her loss as that of a benefactor; 
and not only her sorrowing friends and bereaved 
pupils and companions in labour, but the whole po- 
pulation by which she was surrounded, assembled 
in the little church, which she had reared in their 



268 A MEMOIR OF MISS MARGARET MERCER. 

midst by her own exertions, and to which she fondly 
looked as the means of perpetuating the influence 
she had laboured to establish among them, to pay a 
sorrowing tribute to her worth; — and there beneath 
its hallowed chancel rest her loved remains. 

A funeral sermon was preached by the Rev. 
George Adie, who had been so long and so inti- 
mately associated with her in her efforts at useful- 
ness, commemorative of her worth and the grief of 
her friends. 



THE END, 



BETHUNE'S POEMS, 



LINDSAY & BLAKISTON PUBLISH, 

LAYS OF LOVE AND FAITH, 

WITH OTHER 

FUGITIVE POEMS. 

BY THE 

REV. G. W. BETHUNE, D.D. 

This is an elegant Volume, beautifully printed on the finest and whitest 
paper, and richly bound in various styles. 



As one arranges in a simple vase 

A little store of unpretending flowers, 

So gathered I some records of past hours, 
And trust them, gentle reader, to thy grace, 
Nor hope that in my pages thou wilt trace 

The brilliant proof of high poetic powers; 
But dear memorials of happy days, 

When heaven shed blessings on my heart like showers, 
Clothing with beauty e'en the desert place; 
Till I, with thankful gladness in my looks, 

Turned me to God, sweet nature, loving friends, 
Christ's little children, well-worn ancient books, 

The charm of Art, the rapture music sends; 
And sang away the grief that on man's lot attends. 



OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 

We beg leave to express our thanks to the diligent author of these Poems, for this 
additional and highly valuable contribution to the treasures of American literature. 
The prose writings of Dr. Bethune, by their remarkably pure and chaste language, 
their depth and clearness of thought, their force and beauty of illustration, and by their 
intelligent and elevated piety, have justly secured to him a place with the very best 
authors of our land, whose works are destined to exert a wide-spread and most salutary 
influence on the forming character and expanding mind of our growing republic. This 
volume of his collected"poetry, though it be, as the author observes in his beautiful 
introductory sonnet, but the "gathered.records of past hours," or the fruit of moments 
of industrious relaxation from more severe labours, may without fear take its place by 
the side of our best poetic productions; and there are many pieces in it, which, for 
accuracy of rhythm, for refined sentiment, energy of thought, flowing and lucid ex- 
pression, and subduing pathos, are unsurpassed by any writer. 

Exteriorly, and in The matters of paper and typography, this is an elegant volume, 
and so far is a fitting casket for the gems it contains— for gems these beautiful poems 
are, of "purest ray serene" — lustrous jewels — ornaments of purest virgin gold. 

Many hallowed breathings will be found among the poems here collected — all distin- 
guished by correct taste and refined feeling, rarely dazzling by gorgeous imagery, but 
always charming by their purity and truthfulness to nature. — JY*. Y. Commercial. 



The author of this volume has a gifted mind, improved by extensive education; a 
eheerful temper, chastened by religion ; a sound taste, refined and improved by extensive 
observation and much reading, and the gift of poetry. — North American. 

The Volume before us contains much that is truly beautiful ; many gems that sparkle 
with genius and feeling. They are imbued with the true spirit of poesy, and may be 
read again and again with pleasure. — Inquirer. 



LINDSAY & BLAKISTON PUBLISH, 

SCENES IN THE LIVES OF THE PATRIARCHS 
AND PROPHETS ; 

A COMPANION TO THE 

SCENES IN THE LIFE OF THE SAVIOUR AND THE APOSTLES. 

EDITED BY THE REV. H. HASTINGS WELD. 

BEAUTIFULLY ILLUSTRATED BY" 
EIGHT ENGRAVINGS ON STEEL, BY SARTAIN. 

INCLUDING 

Saul presenting his Daughter to David Painted by Woodforde. 

A View of Hebron, Vignette Title-page. ... " Bracebridge. 

God's Covenant with Noah " Rothermel. 

Abraham Offering up Isaac " Westall. 

The Arrival of Rebekah " Schopin. 

Jacob at the House of Laban " Schopin. 

Moses Smiting the Rock . " Murillo. 

Elijah Fed by Ravens " Corbould. 

With a choice Selection of Matter from the Writings of 

Milton, Hemans, Wordsworth, Croly, Willis, Young, Sigourney, 

Whittier, Howitt, Scott, Heber, Montgomery, Milman, 

Hannah More, Watts, Dale, Tappan, and other 

Eminent Writers of this and other Countries. 

Handsomely bound in cloth gilt, Turkey Morocco, or in white calf. 



OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 

The character of the scenes represented, the pure and eloquent sacred poetry which 
the work contains, render it a book peculiarly befitting presentation at that season when 
the world is celebrating the birth of its Saviour. We hope this joint effort of the pencil 
and pen to render familiar the sacred scenes of the Old Testament, will meet the support 
which it deserves from all lovers of the sacred volume. — Christian Advocate and Journal. 



We do but simple justice when we declare, that it has seldom fallen to our lot to 
notice a book which possesses so many and such varied attractions. Mr. Weld has 
gathered from the best writers the most beautiful of their works, in illustration of his 
theme, and prepared for the reader a rich repast. We are assured that the volume before 
us will, like those which preceded it, come acceptably before the public, and be a favourite 
offering during the approaching holiday season. — Graham's Magazine. 

It is a handsome octavo, beautifully illustrated with engravings on steel, in Sartain's 
best manner. It is published in uniform style with "The Scenes in the Life of the 
Saviour," and is every way worthy to continue this fine series of scriptural works. 
The literary portion of the volume is admirably chosen, embracing many of the most 
distinguished names in America. As a work of art, it is a credit to the book-making 
of our country. — Boston Atlas. 

This is pre-eminently a book of beauty— printed in the best style, on the finest and 
fairest paper, and embellished with the richest specimens of the engraver's art. Its 
contents comprise a choice selection from the writings of celebrated poets, illustrative 
of the character, the countries, and of the times of the Patriarchs and Prophets. The 
elevated spirit and character of the sacred poetry in this volume, as well as its surpass- 
ing beauty, will render it peculiarly valuable as a present or an ornament for the parlour 
table. — Christian Observer. 



LINDSAY & BLAKISTON PUBLISH, 

THE MIRROR OF LIFE, 

A TRULY AMERICAN BOOK, ENTIRELY ORIGINAL, 

PRESENTING A VIEW OF THE PROGRESS OF LIFE, 

FROM INFANCY TO OLD AGE: 

Illustrated by a series of Eleven Engravings, beautifully 
executed on Steel, 

BY J. SARTAIN, PHILADELPHIA, 

INCLUDING 

Infancy, (Vignette Title,) Designed by Schmitz. 

Childhood, Painted " Eichholtz. 

Boyhood, (Frontispiece,) Painted " Osgood. 

Girlhood " Rossiter. 

Maidenhood " Rothermel. 

The Bride " Rossiter. 

The Mother " Rossiter. 

The Widow " Rossiter. 

Manhood, Designed " Rothermel. 

Old Age " Rothermel. 

The Shrouded Mirror, Designed " Rev. Dr. Morton. 

The literary contents comprise original articles in prose and verse, from 

the pens of 

Rev. G. W. Bethune, Rev. Clement M. Butler, Mrs. Sigotjrney, Mrs. 

Osgood, Mrs. Hale, Mrs. Ellet, J. T. Readlet, Rev. M. A. De 

Wolfe Howe, Miss Sedgwick, Rev. Wi. B. Sprague, Rev. 

H. Hastings Weld, Miss Caroline E. Roberts, Bushrod 

Bartlett, Esq.-, Alice G. Lee, Hope Hesselttne, 

AND OTHER FAVOURITE AUTHORS OF OUR OWN COUNTRY. 

EDITED BY MRS. L. C. TUTHILL, 

And richly bound in various styles. 



OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 

This is an elegant volume ; with an excellent design, combining all that is attractive 
in typographical execution, with beautiful engravings, it illustrates the progress of 
human life in a series of mezzotints of the most fliii?hed style. These handsome pic- 
tures present boyhood and girlhood, the lover and the loved, the bride and the mother, 
the widow and old age, with many other scenes that will leave a pleasing and salutary 
impression. The literary department is executed by a variety of able and entertaining, 
writers, forming altogether a beautiful gift-book, appropriate to all seasons. — JV". Y. Ob- 
server. 



A most beautiful gem of a book, and a superb specimen of artistical skill, as well as 
a "Mirror of Life." As a brilliant and tasteful ornament for the centre-table, or a 
memento of affection and good wishes, to be presented in the form of a Birthday, 
Christmas, or New Year's gift, to a friend, it is richly entitled to the consideration and 
patronage of the public— Christian Observer. 



The idea is a happy one, and the work is every way worthy of its subject. Without 
being too costly, it is in every respect a very handsome volume ; the sentiments it con- 
tains are not only unobjectionable, but salutary ; and we cannot conceive a gift of the 
kind which, between intelligent friends, would be more acceptable to the receiver or 
honourable to the giver. — JV*. Y. Commercial. 



SCENES IN THE LIVES OF THE APOSTLES; 

ILLUSTRATED BY 

CELEBRATED POETS AND PAINTERS. 

EDITED DY 

H. HASTINGS WELD. 
Eight Illustrations, beautifully Engraved on Steel, by Sartain. 



Christ's charge to Peter, by Raphael ; 
er and John healing the Lame Ml„ . 
Beautiful Gate of the Temple, by Raphael ; 



Peter and John healing the Lame Man at the 

Beautiful Gate of the Tempi 
Paul before Agrippa, by Sartain: 
John on the Isle of Patmos, by Decaine. 



The Redeemer, painted by Decaine — Frontis- 
piece ; s 

Antioch in Syria, by Harding — Vignette title; 

John reproving Herod, by Le Brun ; 

Christ, with his Disciples, weeping over Jerusa- 
lem, by Begas ; 

THE LITERARY CONTENTS CONSIST OF UPWARDS OF SEVENTY POEMS, BY 

Bishop Heber, Lowell, Keble, Hannah F. Gould, Clark, Mrs. 

Hemans, Mrs. Sigourney, Barton, Bryant, Miss Landon, Tap- 

pan, Pierpont, Longfellow, Miss Davidson, Dale, Cros- 

well, Percival, Bowring, and other celebrated Poets. 

Beautifully bound, in various styles, to match " Scenes in the Life 
of the Saviour." 

We do not know where we could find a more elegant and appropriate 
present for a Christian friend. It will always have value. It is not one of 
those ephemeral works which are read, looked at, and forgotten. It tells of 
scenes dear to the hearts of Christians, which must ever find there an abiding 
place. — Banner of the Cross. 

Here is truly a beautiful volume, admirable in design, and perfect in its 
execution. The editor, with a refined taste, and a loving appreciation of 
Scripture history, has selected some of the best writings of ancient and modern 
authors in illustration of various scenes in the Lives of the Apostles, whilst 
his own facile pen has given us in prose a series of excellent contributions. 
The lyre of Heber seems to vibrate again as we turn over its pages ; and 
Keble, Jenner, Cowper, Herrick, Bernard, Barton, and a brilliant host of 
glowing writers, shine again by the light of Christian truth, and the beaming 
effulgence of a pure religion. It is an elegant and appropriate volume for a 
Christmas gift. — Transcript. 

The exterior is novel and beautiful ; the typography is in the highest style 
of the art ; and the engravings, nine in number, are among the best efforts 
of Mr. Sartain. The prose articles contributed by the editor are well written ; 
and the poetical selections are made with judgment. The volume is a worthy 
companion of " Scenes in the Life of the Saviour, 5 ' and both are much more 
worthy of Christian patronage than the great mass of annuals. — Presbyterian. 



The above volumes are among the most elegant specimens from the 
American press. In neatness and chasteness of execution, they are perhaps 
unsurpassed. The engravings are of the highest order; and illustrate most 
strikingly, and with great beauty, some of the most sublime and the most 
touching Scrip-ture scenes. They also contain some of the richest specimens 
of Sacred Poetry, whose subject and style are such as deeply to interest the 
imagination, and at the same time to make the heart better. We hope the 
Christian's table, at least, may be adorned with the volumes above mentioned, 
and such as these. — New England Puritan. 



LINDSAY & BLAKISTON 

HAVE RECENTLY PUBLISHED, 

SCENES IN THE LIFE OF THE SAVIOUR, 

ET THE 

POETS AND PAINTERS: 

C OBTAINING 

HAITY GEMS OF AHT A N D GENIUS, 

ILLUSTRATIVE OF 

THE SAVIOUR'S LIFE AND PASSION. 

EDITED BY THE 

REV. RUFUS GRISWOLD. 

THE ILLUSTRATIONS, WHICH ARE EXQUISITELY ENGRAVED ON STEEL, 
BY JOHN SARTAIN, ARE : 



The Holy Family, painted by N. Poussin ; 
The Saviour, by Paul Delaroche ; 
Christ by the Well of Sychar, by Emelie Signol ; 
The Daughter of Jarius, by Delonne ; 



Walking on the Sea, by Henry Richter ; 
The Ten Lepers, by A. Vandyke ; 
The Last Supper, by Benjamin West ; 
The Women at the Sepulchre, by Philip Viet. 



THE LITERARY CONTENTS, COMPRISING SIXTY-FOUR POEMS, ARE BY 

Milton, Hemans, Montgomery, Keble, Mrs* Sigourney, Miss Lan« 

don, Dale, Willis, Bulnncli, Betliune, Longfellow, Whittier*. 

Croly, Klopstock, Mrs* Osgood, Pierpont, Crosswell, and 

other celebrated Poets of this and other Countries* 

The volume is richly and beautifully bound in Turkey Morocco, gilt, white 
calf extra, or embossed cloth, gilt edges, sides and back. 

We commend this volume to the attention of those who would place a 
Souvenir in the hands of their friends, to invite them in the purest strains of 
poetry, and by the eloquence of art, to study the Life of the Saviour. — Christ. Obs. 



The contents are so arranged as to constitute a Poetical and Pictorial Life 
of the Saviour, and we can think of no more appropriate gift-book. In typo- 
graphy, embellishments, and binding, we have recently seen nothing more 
tasteful and rich. — North American. ^ 



We like this book, as well for its beauty as for its elevated character. It 
is just such an one as is suited, either for a library, or a parlour centre-table ; 
and no one can arise from its perusal without feeling strongly the sublimity 
and enduring character of the Christian religion. — Harrisburg Telegraph. 



This is truly a splendid volume in all its externals, while its contents are 
richly worthy of the magnificent style in which they are presented. As illus- 
trations of the Life and Passion of the Saviour of mankind, it will form an 
appropriate Souvenir for the season in which we commemorate his coming 
upon earth. — NeaVs Gazette. 



LINDSAY & BLAKISTON'S PUBLICATIONS. 



A BOOK FOR EVERY CHRISTIAN, 

THE SECOND EDITION. 



MEMOIR OF MISS MARGARET MERGER. 

BY CASPAR MORRIS, M.D. 

A neat 18mo. volume, with a beautiful Engraved 
PORTRAIT OF MISS MERCER, 

OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
Miss Mercer was a daughter of the late Governor Mercer, of Maryland. Her father, 
who was a Virginian, and the descendant of a distinguished family, removed to Straw- 
berry Hill, near Annapolis, Md., soon after his marriage. In the memoir of the daughter, 
we have the moral portraiture of a character of great moral worth. Miss Mercer was 
a Christian, who earnestly sought to promote the glory of the Saviour, in persevering 
efforts to be useful in every position, and especially as a teacher of the young. Her 
energy of mind andelevated principles, united with humility and gentleness, and devoted 
piety,* illustrated in her useful life, rendered her example worthy of a lasting memorial. 
The work is accompanied by numerous extracts from her correspondence. — Christian 
Observer, 

The perusal of this Memoir will do good ; it shows how much can be accomplished by 
superior talents, under the control of a heart imbued with love to the Saviour. The 
contemplation of the character of Miss Mercer may lead others to put forth similar 
efforts, and reap a like reward. — Christian Chronicle. 



It is impossible to read this Memoir without the conviction that Miss Mercer was a 
very superior woman, both in her attainments and her entire self-consecration. In 
laying down the book, w T e feel alike admiration for the biographer and the subject of the 
Memoir. — Presbyterian. 

WATSON'S NEW DICTIONARY OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS. 

A neat 12mo. Volume in plain and extra bindings. 



A NEW DICTIONARY OF POETICAL QUOTATIONS, 

CONSISTING OF ELEGANT EXTRACTS ON EVERY SUBJECT, 

Compiled from various Authors, and arranged under appropriate heads, 

BY JOHN T. WATSON, M.D. 

OPINIONS OF THE PRESS. 
We may safely recommend this book as a collection of some of the most beautiful 
conceptions, elegantly expressed, to be found in the range of English and American 
poetry. — Saturday Courier. 

We regard this as the best book of a similar character yet published. — Oermantown 
Telegraph. 

In this Dictionary of Quotations every subject is touched upon ; and, while the selec- 
tion has been carefully made, it has the merit of containing the best thoughts of the 
Poets of our own day, which no other collection has.— U. S. Gazette. 



The selections in this book are made with taste from all poets of note, and are classed 
under a great variety of subjects. — Presbyterian. 



The Quotations appear to have been selected with great judgment and taste, by one 
well acquainted with whatever is most elegant and beautiful in the whole range of 
literature.— Christian Observer. 



'b Id 



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